34 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
And what had the farm done that year? After all 
the items of sales and expenditure were footed up it 
was found that the same land that had yielded our 
father less than $800 had yielded us a net profit of | 
more than $2,500. Alfalfa had worked this miracle. 
It had given us the hay with which to feed the larger 
number of lambs, and through the soil enrichment 
that it had given the fields it had made possible the 
heavy crop of corn that we had fed to the lambs, so 
really to alfalfa should be credited both corn and 
hay. Further, alfalfa had made it possible to con- 
tinue feeding lambs. When we were beginning, and 
were almost without alfalfa hay, we had fed largely 
of oilmeal and wheat bran to balance up the ration. 
This was necessary; experiment proved that. With- 
out plenty of digestible protein in the ration the 
lamb does not gain much. We made good lambs 
through the aid of the bran and oilmeal, but it cost 
us too much. When finally we had our own alfalfa 
hay to furnish. protein we made two lots of lambs. 
They had equal merit in the beginning as near as 
we could tell, for they were of the same bunch, se- 
lected to get two like lots. The one pen was fed with 
timothy hay, with some clover, shredded corn fod- 
der, corn, wheat bran and a little oilmeal. They 
grew well, but each pound of gain made cost us 6140. 
The second lot was fed with good alfalfa hay and 
corn only. With them the cost of gain was only 
3%4c. As the price of lambs declined during the 
nineties we would have had to give up had not al- 
falfa come to our rescue. 
