SHEEP FEEDING. 457 



health, thrift and comfort of the animals are found in an 

 equal degree in the feeding of sheep. The effect is shown 

 in the wool, which is of a length, clearness, style, and 

 particularly strength of staple rarely found on sheep win- 

 tered on dry feed. There is no jar, or tender place in the 

 wool indicating the point in the growth of the fibre where 

 the sheep changed from green to dry feed. All the wool 

 buyers observed this ; and the wool, it is believed, com- 

 manded a higher price than any other clip bought from 

 first hands in this or any of the adjoining counties. 



" It is not claimed that the steaming of feed adds to its 

 nutritive elements. But as the pulverization and stirring 

 of the soil promote the growth of plants by making the 

 plant food more accessible to the plants, so the steaming 

 of feed makes it at once more palatable and more readily 

 digested and assimilated by the animals, and performs the 

 same office for their food that cooking does for ours." 



We have no doubt that Mr. Wales' views of the improve- 

 ment of the food by steaming, for sheep, is correct. Our 

 experiments, which long ante-dated his, gave us the fullest 

 confidence in this mode of feeding. English farmers find 

 great benefit from succulent roots for sheep-feeding, and 

 cooking produces very much the same effect. We think it 

 probable, however, that ensilage will take the place in 

 sheep-feeding both of roots and cooking. The green corn, 

 clover and grass, preserved in silo, may be expected to 

 accomplish all that is to be desired m this respect. 

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