FEEDING FOR MEAT 373 



A comparison with the increase of fattening oxen 

 shows that the sheep stores the larger proportion of fat 

 in the dry substance laid on. 



Sheep liberally fed give a larger increase to the 1,000 

 pounds live weight than steers. With animals weighing 

 from 75 to 150 pounds each, the daily gain with good 

 management may range from .2 to .5 pound a head, or 

 from 2 to 5 pounds to the 1,000 pounds, live weight, the 

 increase varying according to age, conditions, and liber- 

 ality of feeding. Lambs wiU sometimes greatly exceed 

 the above maximum. If we base our estimates upon what 

 will occur with the maturer animals, a number of lambs 

 or sheep weighing 1,000 pounds, perhaps seven, perhaps 

 twice as many, will store daily .15 to .40 pound of pro- 

 tein and from 1.4 to 3.5 pounds of fat. 



469. Food needs of fattening sheep. — ^After long-con- 

 tinued and careful experiments in feeding a fattening- 

 ration to mattire sheep, whose composition was investi- 

 gated at various stages of fatness, Henneberg concludes 

 that the very small amount of protein tissue laid on by 

 such animals may be ignored. Pfeiffer reached the same 

 conclusion from experiments with the same class of 

 animals. This view would not hold with lambs during 

 their increase from weaning time to one hundred pounds 

 in weight, for in this period there must be a material and 

 continuous storage of nitrogenous tissue. 



As is the case with steers, the demand for protein 

 storage is seen to be small with mature fattening sheep, 

 the constructive use of the ration bemg largely directed 

 to fat formation. The more recent views of the func- 

 tion of the nutrients allow us to believe that, as with 

 bovines, carbohydrates and perhaps fats play a leading 

 part in supplying raw materials for the carcass increase. 



