On the Feeding of Stcch. 
227 
Practical men have failed hitherto to examine and collect those 
data from which alone conclusions could safely be drawn, and 
consequently scientific men have not been armed for those inves- 
tigations which would belong to their province of research. 
But farmers cannot wait until science has spoken authori- 
tatively ; they must act directly, and therefore their practice 
must be guided by the safest approximate estimate which they 
can form. 
On the question of the value of the excrement dprived from 
the consumption of 1 ton of straw as food, there will not, I think, 
be as wide a divergence of opinion as on that of the worth of 
that same amount in its primary state as straw. 
Those who set the highest^ value on straw for feeding pur- 
poses rest their views chiefly on the supply of carbonaceous 
matter which it contains, and its fitness for digestion, assimilation, 
and combustion In the animal economy. The worth of the 
residuum would, in their view, depend chiefly on the minerals 
contained in it, to which they might not attach so much import- 
ance as writers of a different school. 
Hence those who put the highest value on the straw may pos- 
sibly put the lowest on the residuum. All, therefore, whether 
they value straw at 35s. per ton, or at 20s., may concur 
in estimating the residuum at about 10s. per ton, and in 
charging the stock with at least 10s. per ton for the nutriment 
extracted, the only point with which we are here concerned. 
At this rate the animal eating 140 lbs., or 10 stone = — of 1 ton 
, , , _ 10 X 12d. , ^ 
per week must be charged = 7to. for straw con- 
sumed in a week. 
The item of attendance yet remains to be assessed. 
A man at lis. a-week, with a boy to help him at 4s. (in all 
15s.), will be wanted for 30 head of stock, giving an average 
cost of %d. per head. 
We thus arrive at a charge of 
s. a. 
For straw consumed 0 7J 
„ expense of cutting straw 0 4| 
„ attendance 0 6 
In all 16 
per week as an outstanding claim against the value of the 
manure. 
If, further, we adopt the estimate of the author of the Prize 
Essay on Straw, that a beast fed in box, or covered yard, makes 
1 ton of manure per month, and allow 8s. per ton as a fair value 
for manure of such quality ; if, moreover, we allow 24 lbs. per 
Q 2 
