64 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



adequate because the legume hay furnished not only lime 

 but also a fair amount of this vitamine which was neces- 

 sary for the animal's well being. That is all as I remem- 

 ber, use lime. Professor Hart within the last two years 

 has taken this old disastrous ration and made it entirely 

 satisfactory by using legume hay and also for extra safety 

 put in cod liver oil, because cod liver oil contains this vita- 

 mine in very great abundance. Of course that would not 

 be a practical dairy ration, but they made that experiment 

 so as to analyze the conditions fully, and to satisfy their 

 own scientific curiosity. 



Then in the further advancement of knowledge the 

 next most important step made was in the discoveries of 

 Dr. Forbes, then of the Ohio Experiment Station. Dr. 

 Forbes fed his cows in nutritional experiments during sev- 

 eral winters, rations that we all thought at that time were 

 absolutely inadequate for high milk production, made up 

 of legume hay, corn silage, corn grain, and several of the 

 common protein-rich concentrate mixtures with plenty of 

 salt and water. To his surprise and the surprise of all of 

 us when he analyzed the fat of these cows, the feces and 

 urine produced, and also the milk secreted, he found these 

 cows on these excellent dairy rations were steadily losing 

 lime and phosphorus from their bodies in the full flush of 

 milk productions. 



We did not know what to think about the situation. 

 He then tried the effect of adding various mineral supple- 

 ments to that ration, ground limestone meal and calcium 

 citrate. To his surprise, even when an abundant amount 

 of lime was furnished, which was apparently much more 

 than the cow needed, these good dairy cows still lost lime 

 from their bodies. In one trial in Wisconsin during ten 

 days a cow lost one-fifth of all the lime in her body, show- 

 ing the tremendous loss of lime that can follow on an in- 

 adequate ration of a milk-producing cow. 



Without going further into the history of the matter, 

 what is the present status of our knowledge? It looks to 

 me as though we would be able, by means of the Babcock 

 test, to develop a cow's milk producing and butter-fat pro- 



