2IO FEEDING FARM ANIMALS 



should form not more than 50 per cent of the fodder fed, 

 for the reason first, that its protein content is not high ; 

 and second, that it has not proved entirely satisfactory or 

 safe when fed continuously as the sole fodder ration. 



Fed to cattle, the aim should be to alternate the feeding 

 with clover or some other legume. Though not equal to 

 clover or alfalfa as a food for calves, when finely grown 

 and well cured, it may, with much propriety form at least 

 one half the fodder ration. It may also be fed thus to beef 

 cattle, the other fodder in all such instances being legumi- 

 nous. Cut and cured in good form, it is superior to timothy 

 as a milk producer, but when overripe it is of little value for 

 such feeding and may do harm. 



Fed to sheep, it is highly important that it shall be of 

 fine growth. When thus grown and well cured, sheep eat it 

 with avidity, but when coarse, overripe or overcured, it is 

 less valuable than straw of some of the small cereals. Fed 

 to lambs at the Michigan experiment station, it proved 

 less valuable than clover hay and oat straw fed together, the 

 grain fed being corn. 



For swine, it has low feeding value. Unless when it 

 contains seed, it has practically no feeding value as the an- 

 imals will not eat enough of it to make it in any considerable 

 degree even a food of support. But in some instances, 

 they have been carried through the winter by allowing them 

 to eat the heads of matured millet, when other food was 

 not obtainable. 



For horses, millet, if well cured, may usually be made 

 to form half the fodder ration, but if fed continuously for 

 any considerable period, serious complications may follow. 

 In 'the prairie sections of the Northwest where considerable 

 millet is grown for hay, it is claimed that horses have died 

 from the exclusive feeding ot millet hay. Experiments con- 

 ducted at the North Dakota experiment station apparently 

 justify the following conclusions : ( i ) That feeding millet 

 increases unduly the action of the kidneys; (2) that it 

 causes a swelling of the joints that leads to lameness, which 



