Some Foods Refined by Livestock 



Livestock may be broadly classified into two groups : those 

 which refine crops unfit for human consumption, and those 

 which condense crops that are fit for human food. 



TABLE 2. DISPOSAL OF GRAIN AND HAY CROPS 

 Approximate proportions consumed by man and beast * 



* Seed, storage, and exports unaccounted for. 



A Graphic Summary of Farm Crops. Bureau of Agricultural Economics, United States 

 Department of Agriculture, Miscellaneous publications Number 512, February 1943, page 12. 



The farmer uses beef cattle, sheep, and dairy cows to re- 

 fine bulky, inedible crops into food fit for man. These an- 

 imals were equipped by nature with a digestive system that 

 enables them to handle large quantities of coarse, bulky 

 foods. During the summer months animals refine the inedible 

 pasture grasses into milk and meat. In the winter they refine 

 the inedible part of the crops produced the previous sum- 

 mer, such as timothy, alfalfa, and clover hay, cornstalks, 

 straw, by-products of the milling industry, and low-quality 

 grains. The livestock refine these inedible products into the 

 nutritious but expensive products: beef, mutton, lamb, milk, 

 butter, and cheese. 



Beef cattle, sheep, and dairy cattle are not only refiners of 

 inedible food; to a considerable extent they are also har- 



