CALF FEEDING I1ST ALABAMA AND MISSISSIPPI. 39 



7. The calves of lots 1, 2, and 3 produced 29.2, 26.2, and 21.3 

 pounds of manure per head per day. No bedding was used and the 

 manure was scraped up and weighed daily. Some of the liquid 

 was lost. 



8. During shipment the calves of lots 1, 2, and 3 shrank 48, 29, and 

 36 pounds, respectively, or 6.8, 4.2, and 5.0 per cent of their live 

 weight. 



9. The calves dressed out 54.4, 56.0, and 55.9 per cent of market- 

 able meat. These percentages indicate that there was practically no 

 difference in the fatness of the calves of lots 2 and 3, but both lots 

 were much fatter than the calves of lot 1. 



V. FATTENING LATE (SHORT-AGED) CALVES FOR 



MARKET. 



HANDLING OF LATE CALVES. 



In the foregoing parts of this bulletin are discussed various meth- 

 ods of fattening calves for the market during winter months. Ex- 

 perience has taught many feeders that a good growthy calf 6 months 

 or more of age goes on feed and is fed much more satisfactorily than 

 calves of a younger age. A calf 6 to 8 months old when put on feed 

 does not seem to go off feed so easily as a younger calf, and as a 

 result usually makes a larger and more uniform gain in weight from 

 month to month than calves from 3 to 5 months of age. 



In the South, where cattle usually are handled as a side line on 

 the farm, the calves usually are dropped any time from January 

 to August and some even later. Even on the good stock farms, where 

 the time of breeding the cows is regulated as far as possible, it is 

 seldom that all the calves are born during the early spring months ; 

 there are always some late or short-aged calves if the bull is kept with 

 the cows until most of them get with calf. 



How to handle these calves has long been a problem. When calves 

 are selected for feeding purposes in the fall, the late ones always are 

 cut back because of their age and size. Many of the younger ones 

 are permitted to nurse their dams during the winter months, are 

 weaned in the spring, and put on pasture to be grown out as yearlings 

 or two-year-olds. 



In the fall of 1915 there were a large number of such calves on the 

 farm at Abbott, Miss., where the cooperative cattle-feeding work was 

 being conducted jointly by the Bureau of Animal Industry and the 

 Mississippi Agricultural College. It was decided to let these calves 

 nurse their dams during the winter, maintaining the dams on a 

 ration of coarse hay, silage, and a small amount of cottonseed meal, 



