454 FEEDING ANIMALS. 



being borne out by the facts. The author, on theory, has 

 regarded the cutting of hay and other coarse fodder for 

 sheep as good economy; and to test this point by an 



ExPEBIMEin?, 



we fed 25 medium-sized grade Merino sheep 50 Ibs. of long, 

 early-cut timothy-hay per day for one week, and, on gather- 

 ing up the fragments each day, found that the average was 

 12 Ibs. per day left uneaten. We found, also, that this hay 

 was not left because of over-feeding, for when fed 75 Ibs. 

 per day they ate the same proportion of it. 



They were then given 50 Ibs. of the same hay per day cut 

 % inch long, for one week, and, on carefully gathering up 

 what was left, found less than 2 Ibs. average per day 

 uneaten. On increasing this cut hay to 60 Ibs. per day, 

 this was found to be all they would eat. This was con- 

 tinued till we came to the conclusion that 60 Ibs. of cut 

 hay equaled, for sheep, 75 Ibs. of the same hay uncut. We 

 also found, in the case of good fodder corn, that twice as 

 much of it was eaten by sheep, when cut & inch in length, 

 as when uncut. In short, our experiments proved that 

 sheep pay as well for fine chaffing of coarse fodder as any 

 class of farm stock. The experiment was intended simply 

 to test the effect of cutting the hay and fodder corn when 

 feeding store sheep. 



In fattening sheep we have experimented on the effect of 

 cooking hay and grain together. For this purpose we 

 mixed 100 Ibs. corn-meal, 100 Ibs. of wheat middlings and 

 50 Ibs. of linseed oil-meal (old style). One hundred pounds 

 of this mixture was mixed with 200 Ibs. of cut hay, the hay 

 being first moistened; and then 600 Ibs. of this mixture 

 were placed in a steam-box and cooked with live steam for 

 one hour and a half. The sheep, of about 100 Ibs. weight, 

 consumed 3 Ibs. ^er head per day in two feeds, morning 



