142 Cattle Problems. 



instead of the fat remaining solid while the meat is cook- 

 ing. 



Evidently the rapid feeding does not improve meat qual- 

 ity, the fat being increased by reduction of muscle and 

 nutritive value under confinement. But exercise while fat- 

 tening* saves muscle, insuring good quality in meat, which 

 is improved feeding, because it improves meat quality. 



Muscle being the basis of food-value in meat, food-value 

 gradually increases, when exercise is ample, as in the 

 Western herdsf for instance, until the growth be com- 

 plete, at mature age. By too early fattening this important 

 source of increase in muscle and food is ignored, and cut 

 off, causing great loss. 



Colts are allowed by many good horse breeders to ma- 

 ture only slowly, having ample exercise, with but little or 

 no grain, because they make more enduring growth with- 

 out, than with rich food ; and heifers require time, and ex- 

 ercise to develop muscle and capacity for digestion, breed- 

 ing, and milk-yield, as colts do to give them power for 

 activity and work. 



The Channel Island cattle breed early, but these lawn 

 cattle are lighter in their muscles than any other breed, 

 from having been tethered or tied from time immemorial. 

 The proteids of the food go, in large degree, in such cases 

 through the udder to the pail. Having but little muscle 

 to mature, but little blood and time are required in form- 

 ing their muscular structure. Hence the slender muscles 

 of the breed are formed with but little material at an 

 early age, in that mild climate. The muscular growth be- 

 ing only slender and completed early, a sufficient surplus 

 of breeding blood remains to give rise to coupling, and 

 breeding at an early age. So the light muscular growth 



* Sec Country Gentleman, February 12, 1880, p. 106, Mr. Gillette's Im- 

 proved Feeding. 



t Wc have Been this result in Western Iowa, where we have a small, but 

 good stock-farm. 



