1907.] 



PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 33. 



123 



Summary of Digestion Coefficients (^Per Cent.). 

 Period XII. 



1 Seventeenth report of this station, page 75. 



The results of the two trials in the present experiment 

 agree fairly well one with the other, and the average of the 

 two are nearly equal to the coefficients for corn meal. The 

 coefficients secured with the several sheep in the two previous 

 experiments (1903 and 1904) showed marked differences. 

 While these variations may have been due partially to the 

 quality of the two different lots of hominy (which, however, 

 could not be detected by chemical analysis), it seems probable 

 that the chief cause for the lack of agreement is to be found 

 in the sheep themselves. The writer has frequently noticed 

 that after sheep have been used in digestion work for a num- 

 ber of months their power to digest becomes temporarily 

 weakened. This condition is more noticeable with some sheep 

 than with others, and evidently depends largely upon individ- 

 uality. The digestion coefficients for hominy secured with 

 the Old Sheep (1903) were obtained in one of a series of 

 experiments extending from the autumn of 1902 to March 

 1903. The hominy meal period was the last of the series, 

 and the digestibility of the dry matter varied from 71 to 91 

 per cent. The coefficients reported with the Young Sheep 

 (1904) (75 to 86 per cent, of dry matter digestible) were 

 obtained in a series extending from the autumn of 1903 to 

 the spring of 1904. These sheep were used for the first time 

 in this series, and were alternated to an extent with the Old 



