37 



greater on the part of the feeder than scanting food or giving a 

 maintenance ration, or just a little more. It wastes barn rations. 

 On our poor old pastures the hard task of grazing a living in- 

 duces the steer to limit the struggle to little more than existence. 

 Much goes to run the animal machine and little to growth, and an 

 enormous waste results. Low feeding prolongs the period of 

 growth from two to four years. Birth weight, considered the 

 average weight of a 1,500-pound steer during growth, is about 720 

 pounds. Maintenance for such a steer is Hi pounds daily. If 

 four years are required to fit him for the shambles instead of two 

 yeara, maintenance ration is lost for two years. This amounts to 

 4- tons 395 pounds. As this is the New England style of beef 

 production, in this factor alone is found loss enough to ruin the 

 business. 



Type and Time. 

 The combination of a good type of steer with quick time of 

 maturity has another important bearing. The good type can be 

 sold at full market rates at less weight and therefore in less time 

 than can the poor type. This is important, as the larger an 

 animal grows the more it costs to make a pound of growth. Thus, 

 in some experiments made by the writer at the New Hampshire and 

 Missouri State colleges it was found that a pound of gain required 

 a constantly increasing amount of food as calves increased in 

 weight. Thus two calves, requiring when weighing 322 pounds 8.3 

 quarts skim-milk for a pound of gain, at 385 pounds weight re- 

 quired a pound of added meal to maintain the growth, a little later 

 2 pounds of grain, and at 512 pounds weight they were eating 5 

 pounds of hay in addition. At 638 pounds weight they had reached 

 in addition to 20 quarts skim-milk and 3.J pounds grain, the con- 

 sumption of 9A pounds hay without added gain. Year olds weigh- 

 ing 750 pounds required 19 pounds hay for one of gain, two year 

 olds of 1,000 pounds weight required 25 pounds hay for one of 

 growth. Elaborate trials with swine have shown the same truth. 

 The larger the animal the greater the machine to keep in motion 

 and the more the tax of mere existence. Breed for perfection of 

 beef form and feed for finished beef al the highest weight the 

 market will accept at full i)rices. 



Foods and Feeding. 



This part of my subject invites a long chapter where a page or 

 two is at command, and must be treated as have been previous 

 sections of my subject, in mere generalizations. 



The heavy percentage of the ration required for iniiiiitcnance 



