PRECAUTIONS IN FEEDING. 201 



example, will eat it with great avidity if they are allowed to do 

 so. They eat entirely too much of this dried product and then 

 take water into the stomach, which is followed by an abnormal 

 swelling. Under these circumstances it stands to reason that 

 serious complications will follow. It frequently happens that 

 sheep are strangled by swallowing this desiccated residuum too 

 rapidly. It is, however, easy to avoid such accidents by merely 

 mixing the cossettes with about 40 per cent, of water and allow- 

 ing the product to swell. Ritter mixes only 16 per cent, water. 

 Some recommend that the cossettes be well ground into a 

 powder. By such precautions the product is swallowed with 

 ease and eaten with relish. However, when first fed the dried 

 product may be refused, which is probably caused by the curious 

 texture of the forage that may be unpleasant to the eye, or for 

 other reasons; however, such cases are the exception. After 

 several days the animals become accustomed to the cossettes 

 and will eat all placed at their disposal. Up to the present 

 time not a single case has been recorded where an animal has 

 continuously declined to eat this dried residuum. 



Pfeiffer and Lehmann declare that when dried cossettes are 

 fed to an excess, they bring about troubles in the intestinal 

 canal, which, as we may readily suppose, diminishes very 

 materially the coefficiency of digestibility of the fatty sub- 

 stances; and notwithstanding the fact that animals being fed 

 will increase in weight, there is always danger of considerable 

 loss of nutritive substances in the droppings during over-feeding. 



It must be understood that it is not imperative to mix the 

 cossettes with water, as sheep will eat them in a dry state; how- 

 ever, the mixing of water as previously explained is an advan- 

 tage. It allows the cossettes to be more readily combined with 

 other forages, for, as previously pointed out, the dried cossettes 

 alone should not make up the ration. Notwithstanding its com- 

 paratively small volume the product soon satisfies the animals' 

 hunger, due possibly to the swelling of the beet cells in the 

 presence of the fluids of the stomach, such as gastric juices, etc. 

 The quantity of this feed to be given to animals differs with 

 the object in view. According to Mercker and Morgen the 

 amounts may be as follows: 



