FEEDII^G AiNTD WATERING. 31 



a saving of nearly 50 per cent in the cost compared with winter 

 prices. Of course if everybody goes to buying in the summer, prices 

 will go up, but we may expect bran to maintain lower prices during 

 the summer months. " 



Linseed Cake is largely employed as animal food in England, 

 the greater part of that made in this country being exported there. 

 But Am.ericans are learning its value, and are feeding more of 

 it than formerly. It acts both as a medicine and as a food. It is 

 mildly laxative to the bowels, soothing to the air-passages, and 

 gives gloss to the coat. The " new process " meal contains much 

 less oil than that made by the old process, and is therefore less 

 relaxing and fattening, while the proportion of albuminoids is 

 greater. To make a gruel, the oil-meal is simmered in water until 

 it becomes a mucilagenous mass, into which bran is stirred and the 

 whole fed warm. As a feed substance oil meal is useful mainly to 

 mix in small quantities with other materials. A ration containing 

 six parts of oats, four of corn, and two of linseed meal, would be 

 very nearly equivalent to the oats and beans which form the grain 

 staple of food given to horses in England. 



Cotton Seed Meal is similar in its chemical composition to 

 linseed meal, but is more highly concentrated, and contains a larger 

 proportion of nitrogenous elements. It should be fed with great 

 caution, in small quantities, and never alone. 



Carrots have a food value greater than their composition 

 would indicate. Eighty-five per cent of their bulk is water, and of 

 the solids which remain, nearly one-tenth is fiber. Yet they serve 

 to cool the system, and assist in the digestion of other food. They 

 should be fed a few at a time, two or three times a week. Parsnips 

 have nearly the same composition as carrots, except that they con- 

 tain even a larger per cent of water. In England and France they 

 are fed in the same way as carrots. 



In making up a feeding ration for a horse, the first point is to 

 find out how much the horse will eat ; the next is to regulate the 

 ration according to the weather, and the amount and character of 

 the work the horse is expected to perform. The harder the work 

 and the colder the weather, the greater the proportion of carbohy- 

 drates required in the food. The experience of street-car com- 

 panies, and other corporations which work large numbers of horses, 

 shows that a nutritive ratio of one to six is best for horses kept at 

 hard work in cold weather. In the stables of the West Division 

 Street Railroad of Chicago, where several thousand horses are kept, 



