MEAT PRODUCTION 379 



and this may be increased at the rate of one-third of a 

 pound per week from three to six weeks, according to the 

 kinds of food fed, the age of the animals and the probable 

 duration of the feeding period. As with cattle, the grain 

 fed may be more concentrated as the fattening progresses. 



Swine may usually be led up to a full grain ration 

 much more quickly than cattle and sheep. This is owing 

 to the fact, first, that grain has probably been fed to them 

 all along, and second, that before the final fattening be- 

 gins, they have probably been given not less than half a 

 full grain ration. In but few instances, therefore, is it 

 necessary to take more than one to two weeks to bring 

 them up to a full grain ration. 



Food consumed and increase. The relation between 

 the food consumed and the increase from it widens from 

 birth to maturity, that is, the more advanced the age of the 

 animal, the greater is the amount of the food required to 

 make the increase. That it should be so is the outcome, 

 first, of the more active character of the digestive and 

 assimilative organs near the birth period; and second, of 

 the increase called for in the food of maintenance as the 

 animals grow older. That it should be so is what may be 

 expected from the gradual decrease in relative gains in 

 cattle and sheep, as the birth period is receded from. But 

 it has also been found true with swine, where the daily in- 

 crease is less rapid during the first three or four months 

 than subsequently. 



With cattle and sheep it is not easy to draw the com- 

 parison between relative increase and the amount of food 

 used in making it, between animals that are being grown 

 and those that are being fattened, owing to the difference 

 in the relative proportion of grain and concentrates fed 

 to these. It is much easier to draw the comparison as to 

 relative cost, and the difference in cost may be taken as 

 an approximate basis, but not an exact basis of the differ- 

 ence in the amounts of food consumed. In "Profitable 



