1867. 



XEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



541 



COMPARATIVE VALUE OP PODDEB.. 



Wc should like to know the comparative value, 

 or ratio of value, of English hay, rowen, Hunga- 

 rian grass, ai'.d green cut oats as IVjod for milch 

 cows. Also after cows are lioused for the winter, 

 how they should be fed ? What quantity of hay, 

 root crops, slioits, fine feed, oil jneal or middlings 

 orof eiih'.r, should he fed to them daily? Wc 

 rarely Ihid a farmer who can tell us how much hay, 

 in weight, a cow will ordinarily consume a day, 

 either wiih or without other food. Inquirer. 



Remarks. — The incjuiries of our correspon- 

 dent are searching — they go deep. We doubt 

 •whether the exact information he desires is at- 

 tainable here, or in any other country ; and 

 yet, they are the very things we ought to know. 

 Perhaps the Massuchuseiis Agricultural Col- 

 lege will shed light upon them, when it is well 

 under way. We find tables in the scientific 

 books which may aflTord some gratification to 

 the reader. One of them is prefixed by 

 the remarks, that "in the ease of the ox the 

 daily waste or loss of muscle and tissue re- 

 quires that he should consume 20 to 24 ounces 

 of gluten or albumen, which will be supplied 

 by any of the following weights of vegetable 

 food : — 



Turnips 120 lbs. 



C.ibbage 70 " 



Wiieat, or other 



white grain. . . 11 " 



Beans or peas . . 6 " 



Oil cake 4 " 



If common hay be taken as the standard of 

 comparison, then, to yield the same amount of 

 nourishment as 14 lbs. of hay, experiments on 

 feeding made by different persons, and in dif- 

 ferent countries, say that a weight of the other 

 kinds of food must be given, which is repre- 

 sented by the number opposite to each article 

 in the following table : — 



Hay 



Clover hay . 

 Green clover 

 Wheat straw 

 Barley straw 

 Oat straw . . 

 Pea straw . . 

 Potatoes . . 

 Old potatoes . 

 Carrots, (red) . 



Carrots, (white) 



45 lbs. 



35 " 



50 " 



20 to 30 " 



3" 5 " 



5" 6 " 



5" 6 " 



4" 7 " 



5 " 



2" 4 " 



Another statement is, that the generally nu- 

 tritive value of different kinds of food has 

 also been repi-esented theoretically, by sup- 

 posing it to be very nearly in proportion to 

 the quantity of nitrogen, or of gluten, which 

 vegetables contain. Though this cannot be 

 considered as a correct principle, yet as the 

 ordinary kinds of food on which stock is fed 

 contain an ample supply of carbon for respira- 

 tion, with a comparatively small proportion of 



nitrogen, these theoretical determinations are 

 by no means without their value, and they ap- 

 proath, in many cases, very closely to the 

 practical values above given, as deduced from 

 actual trial. Thus assuming that 10 lbs. of 

 hay }ield a certain amount of nourishment, 

 then of the other vegetable substances it will 

 be necessary, according to theory, to give the 

 following quantities, in order to produce the 

 same general effect in feeding : — 



Hay 10 lbs. Carrots, (retl) . 35 lbs 



Clovtrhay 8 " 



Vetch h:iy 4 " 



Wheat straw . . • 52 " 

 Barley straw . . . 52 " 



Oat i-traw 55 " 



Pea straw 6 " 



Potatoes 28 " 



Old potatoes .... 4J " 



Turnips Cv) " 



Mangold-wurtzel . 50 " 



If the feeder be careful to supply his stock 

 with a mixture or occasional change of food — 

 and especiallj% where necessary, with a proper 

 proportion of fatty matter — he may safely reg- 

 ulate, by the numbers in the above tables, the 

 quantity of any one which he ought to substi- 

 tute for a given weight of any of the others — 

 since the theoretical and practical results do 

 not in general very greatly differ. 



We have drawn these remarks mainly from 

 Prof. Johnston's Elements of AgricvMural 

 Chemistry, as the nearest approach of any- 

 thing we could find, as replies, to the above in- 

 cjuiries. Our correspondent has begun a good 

 work ; we wish he would continue it by mak- 

 ing exact experiments with his stock the com- 

 ing winter, and let us have the results in the 

 spring. Who so well qualified as himself for 

 this, now that he has the spirit of the matter 

 in his mind, and is really desirous to know the 

 facts in the case ? 



In addition to the foregoing, we copy the 

 following results of careful and laborious ex- 

 periments conducted under the direction of the 

 Massachusetts Board of Agriculture by John 

 Brooks and Moses Newhall, with the dairy on 

 the farm of the State Reform School at West- 

 borough in 1856. The details, as published 

 in the Report of the Secretary of the Board, 

 are very minute. Each animal, as well as 

 the food it consumed and the milk it pro- 

 duced, was separately weighed, and the results 

 given in elaborate tables, for which we have 

 not space. It will be seen that English hay 

 is put at $15 and meadow or swale hay and 

 cornstalks at $10 per ton ; shorts at one and a 



