Wyoming Experiment Station. 



The percentages of these nutrients that are digested by 

 an animal are found in the following manner : A weighed 

 amount of feed is given the animal, a sample of the feed being 

 analyzed. The dung voided during the feeding period is also 

 weighed and analyzed, and the difference between the amount 

 of each nutrient fed and the amount voided is necessarily the 

 amount digested. 



THE NUTRITIVE RATIO. 



Carbohydrates and fats perform very much the same work 

 in the animal economy, save that a given amount of fat will 

 do about 2.4 times the work that the same amount of carbo- 

 hydrates will do. So the amount of digestible fat in a feed is 

 usually multiplied by 2.4 and added to the digestible carbo- 

 hydrates. The proportion of the digestible protein to the di- 

 gestible carbohydrates and fat is then expressed by a ratio, 

 the amount of digestible protein being taken as a unit. For 

 example, if there is 10 per cent of digestible protein in a feed 

 and 50 per cent of digestible carbohydrates, the nutritive ratio 

 is said to be 1 15. 



TABLES OP DIGESTIBLE NUTRIENTS. 



Enough analyses have been made and enough digestion 

 experiments carried on so that tables have been prepared show- 

 ing the average percentages of digestible nutrients in various 

 feeding stuffs. Such tables may be found in any standard 

 work on the feeding of live stock. These tables appear as 

 follows : 



This table indicates that in feeding 100 pounds of alfalfa 

 hay, 92 pounds of dry matter are fed, containing 52 pounds of 

 digestible nutrients, with a nutritive ratio of i 13.9. One thing 



