RELATION OF FOOD TO ANIMAL REQUIREMENTS. 99 



In the case of an adult animal not increasing in weight, 

 and performing a minimum amount of work, as, for 

 instance, a horse or ox in a stable, the quantity of food 

 required is reduced to its smallest limits. An ox of 1000 lb. 

 live weight, quiet in the stall, will require daily, according 

 to the German experiments, about 0*5 — 0*6 lb. of digestible 

 albuminoids,* and 7"1 — 8'4 lb. of digestible non-albuminous 

 food, reckoned as starch, to preserve its condition. With 

 sheep the maintenance diet must be more liberal, as in 

 their case the growth of wool, with its accompanying fat, 

 is always in progress, and is practically independent of 

 the abundance or poverty of the diet. For 1000 lb. live 

 weight (shorn), sheep fed on meadow hay will require 

 about 0*9 lb. of digestible albuminoids,* and 10 '8 lb. of 

 digestible non-albuminous food, or 16 — 17 lb. dry organic 

 matter, per day, to preserve their condition. If fed on 

 mangels and straw chaff the quantity of dry organic matter 

 must be raised to 20 — 25 lb. In these maintenance diets 

 for adult animals the albuminoid ratio of the food is but 

 1 : 14 in the case of the ox, 1 : 12 in the case of the sheep 

 fed on hay, and the relation is wdder still in the case of 

 the sheep fed on straw and mangels. The inferiority of 

 the latter diet is the cause doubtless of the larger amount 

 of food required. 



If external work is to be performed, the body weight 

 remaining unaltered, the quantity of food must be con- 

 siderably increased, and the food must be of such quality 

 that it may be possible to digest a sufficient amount in 

 the required time. A man doing a fair day's work was 



* These numbers represent true albuminoids, and are, therefore, smaller 

 than the German figures. 



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