I. FATTENING STEERS ON SUMMER PASTURE. 

 ALABAMA, 1912. 



OBJECTS AND PLAN OF THE EXPERIMENT. 



The general plan of the work was similar to that followed in previ- 

 ous years. Usually the steers were purchased in the fall, carried 

 through the winter, divided into lots in the spring, and put on pasture 

 as soon as the grasses were well started. In this experiment most of 

 the steers were purchased late in the spring and put on pasture late 

 in May, with the intention of finishing them for market early in the 

 fall. 



The 90 steers available were divided and fed as follows : 



Lot 1, 29 steers, pasture alone. 



Lot 2, 25 steers, pasture and one-half corn chop and one-half cottonseed cake. 



Lot 3, 36 steers, pasture and cottonseed cake. 



The lots were purposely unequal in number to conform to the size 

 of pasture used. 



The objects of the experiment were (1) to continue the study of 

 fattening steers on pasture; (2) to determine whether it is profitable 

 to feed cottonseed cake to cattle on pasture; (3) to compare cotton- 

 seed cake with a ration of one-half cottonseed cake and one-half corn 

 chop for finishing steers on pasture; and (4) to see which of the three 

 methods is most profitable. 



The steers of the three lots were chiefly grade Herefords, Short- 

 horns, and Aberdeen-Angus. A few were grade Eed Polls. All 

 were 2 and 3 year olds of fair quality. 



CHARACTER AND PRICES OF FEEDS USED. 



The cottonseed cake used in this test was nut size and of good 

 quality, containing about 38 per cent crude protein. The advantages 

 of feeding cake instead of meal are these: Rains do not make the 

 cake unpalatable and winds do not blow it out of the feed bunks ; the 

 cake requires chewing, and greedy steers can not eat more than their 

 share at the expense of the timid ones. "VVlien cottonseed meal is 

 fed in open pastures, rain and wind are liable to cause waste ; greedy 

 steers bolt it and often get scours, which causes the animals to feed 

 out unevenly. 



The corn was shipped in and part of it was badly damaged. That 

 fact must be considered when comparing the gains of the steers in 

 lot 2 with those of the other lots. The cottonseed cake cost $28 a 

 ton on the farm. The corn chop was charged to the steers of lot 2 

 at an average price of 85^ cents a bushel. 



3 



