48 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



matter in the food there were forty-one pounds in the excrement 

 produced. Eighty per cent of the nitrogen contained in the 

 food, 73% of the phosphorus, and yo^^ of the potassium was 

 recovered in the manure. 



There was one cow in that six which gave back in die 

 manurial excrements only 53% of the phosphorus consumed in 

 the food, or only a trifle more than one-half. I do not happen 

 to have complete data regarding that. A cow may have three 

 different uses for phosphorus. If she is not fully grown, she 

 needs phosphorus to complete her own growth. If she is pro- 

 ducing milk, of course her p-urpose is to feed a calf supposed to 

 be by her side. That calf needs phosphorus for his growth, not 

 only for bone, but in practically all other parts of the animal 

 organism. As you know, she may need phosphorus for the 

 growth of an unborn calf. So there are three uses. When an 

 animal must provide phosphorus and use it for those different 

 purposes, it is very plain she is able to utilize close to half of 

 the total amount contained in the food consumed, but as an av- 

 erage about three-fourths of the phosphorus can be recovered 

 in the manurial excrements in dairy farming. 



I am not referring to a work horse or other adult animals, 

 but in live stock farming we are working for some product, 

 either the growth of young stock or the production of milk or 

 such substances, and it will require at least one- fourth of the 

 phosphorus in the food consumed. 



I have here a record of two cows in the Pennsylvania feed- 

 ing experiment station. Seventy-one per cent phosphorus was 

 recovered in the manurial excrements. At Cambridge Univer- 

 sity they conducted an experiment with heifers, and they re- 

 turned 68*^^ of the phosphorus in the manure that was contained 

 in the food. 



I was interested some time ago in an article by Governor 

 Hoard in Hoard's Dairyman, discussing the present condition 

 of the great dairy region in New York, particularly in Herki- 

 mer County, a district that he had been very familiar with 

 thirty or forty years ago. Governor Hoard stated very plainly 

 that those dairy farms had greatly deteriorated in productive 



