304 Agricultural Chemistry — Sheep- Feeding and Manure. 



to some extent by virtue of the large amount of sugar it con- 

 tains. 



From Table 7, we learn that the average quantities of dry- 

 organic-matter consumed weekly to 100 lbs. live weight of 

 animal, were, in Pens \, 2, 3 and 4 respectively, in round num- 

 bers 16£, 15|, 16J, and 16J lbs. — amounts which, when the dif- 

 ference in the qualities of the food are considered, are probably 

 very nearly identical, so far as the supply of the convertible non- 

 nitrogenous organic substances is concerned. The mean of 

 these is about 16 J 1 bs., an amount which, as we shall see more in 

 detail when the results of the several series of experiments are 

 brought together, is about one-third more than was consumed in 

 the case of Series I., notwithstanding that the mean temperature 

 of the period of the latter was 40*6, and that of this 2nd series 

 58 '4. The fact is, however, to be explained by a consideration 

 of the character of the foods employed in the two cases. In 

 Series I. swedes were the standard food, and in Series II. clover- 

 hay, which, compared with the former, would contain a very 

 large amount of inert woody fibre, and hence a much larger 

 amount of gross dry organic substance was taken into the stomachs 

 of the animals, to supply the same amount of that which would be 

 subservient to maintaining the heat or promoting the increase of 

 the body. 



Looking, on the other hand, to the consumption of nitrogen in 

 the several pens by a given weight of animal in a given time, we 

 find here, as in the former series, a want of coincidence in this 

 respect, the amount, as shown in the Table, being, in the first 

 pen. 0 60 ; in the second, 0-51 ; in the third, 0*41 ; and in the 

 fourth, 0'401b. It may be observed, however, that the order of 

 increase in the pens is that of the assumption of nitrogen within 

 a given time, though the amount of it is not in exact proportion to 

 that of the nitrogenous supply. The average weekly consumption 

 of nitrogen in this series is, however, more than half as much 

 again as that in Series I., whilst the rate of increase in the former 

 is less than that of the latter. 



Thus, turning to Table 8, we see that, taking the mean of the 

 four pens, there were 474 lbs. of the special foods and 1442 lbs. 

 of clover-hay consumed to produce 100 lbs. increase in live 

 weight, and that these together contained 1521 lbs. of dry-organic- 

 matter and 44 lbs. of nitrogen, whilst there were in Series I. only 

 860 lbs. of the former and 19J lbs. of the latter required to pro- 

 duce the same amount of increase — there being therefore nearly 

 twice as much gross dry-organic-matter and more than twice as 

 much nitrogen consumed in the one case as in the other, to 

 produce the same effect; from which we learn that the circum- 

 stances of adaptation of the animal and of the food, as well as the 



