254 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



a larger wooden trough, in which alternate layers of cut straw, 

 roots, bean-meal, and oil cake are steamed for the milch cows 

 in winter. It is 13 feet 3 inches long 5 feet 4 inches wide, and 

 3 feet high. A perforated pipe, communicating with the boiler, 

 is laid on the bottom, and by turning a cock, the steam ascends 

 througli tlie mass and " cooks " it. At an elevation of nine feet 

 there is a pipe perforated on the lower side, in communication 

 with the water cistern, and by which an artificial shower can be 

 made to fall on the surface of the steaming mess, and the 

 ascending steam is thus condensed, and its escape prevented. 

 Damaged hay, &c., is rendered agreeable to the cattle by this 

 process. Bean straw, when steamed, is also readily eaten by 

 cattle. 



Turnip cutters are placed in this shed. There is a double- 

 action machine for cattle and sheep. This is an excellent 

 machine. A pulping machine is also used, and works very 

 efficiently. It consists of a number of teeth arranged spirally 

 around a cylinder, revolving on its horizontally-placed axis. 

 The teeth pass betweei*! a revolving spiral, which prevents the 

 machine from choking. A shaft, driven by the steam-engine, 

 runs tln'ougli the steaming shed, and if the engine is at work 

 there is a piece of machinery partly at work in this shed, and 

 partly in the open shed adjoining it, and facing the stack-yard. 

 In this latter shed is a root-washer made of wood, and consist- 

 ing of a frame containing water, in which revolves a skeleton 

 cylinder, or, more strictly speaking, the frustrum of a cone, the 

 taper being scarcely precipitate. At one end the roots are put 

 into the cylinder, and an Archimedian screw at the other end 

 raises and throws them on an inclined plane, whence they fall 

 on the elevator, (formed of curved bars fixed to a leather belt 

 kept revolving,) and which carries them to the steam-driven 

 root-cutter. The cut slices fall into a wooden trough beneath 

 the cutting machine in the steaming shed. 



The next apartment is the chaff-cutting room, thirty feet by 

 sixteen. Here is an oil-cake bruiser, an oat bruiser and a 

 straw-cutter. Of straw-cutters there is a great variety ; some 

 cutting continuously, others giving an intermittent cut; some 

 having knives attached to a disc or wheel, revolving in a vertical 

 plane ; in others the knives are attached to a revolving cylinder, 

 and others again have the cutting blade oscillating vertically. 



