458 
On Pulping Roots for Cattle Food. 
work to the carters and sliephertls as the old turnip-cutters. Our 
confidence in the advantages of this system has been much 
increased by the extensive adoption of it since the recent intro- 
duction of Mr. Bentall's and other pulpers, of which we have 
unmistakeable evidence in a small pamphlet of Mr. Bentall's, 
which has come under our notice within a day or two. This 
contains a selection of 400 reports from agriculturists from 
various parts of England, Scotland, and Ireland, who have 
adopted and borne their testimony to the benefits they have 
derived from it. 
[Statements of experience have been received from many who 
have adopted the practice of pulping roots, and they almost uni- 
versally assert its economy and advantage. These might have 
been arranged in tabular form, as was done in a former volume 
of this Journal (vol. iv.), with a series of testimonies to the 
advantages of Crosskill's clodcrusher, but it has been thought 
better to select a few of the most detailed and explicit of the 
reports, and publish them in full. — J. C. M.] 
1. From Mr. J. B. Wright, Hedderwick-hill, Dunbar, N. B. 
Being impressed with the idea that roots, such as turnips and mangold 
wurzel, are given to stock in too great quantities without a corresponding 
benefit, and that, were more fodder introduced amongst their food in a palat- 
able form, the animals would thrive equally well on a more economical diet, 
the reporter purchased at Carlisle, when the Royal Agricultural Society's 
meeting was held there in 1855, a " Phillips' Root-mincer," made by Woods, 
of Stowmarket, which gained the first premium. Being made for power, it 
was attached to the steam-engine, and since that has worked to the satisfaction of 
all wlio have seen it. Without entering into any minute description of the 
machine, it is sufficient to say that it tears the roots into shreds, the juice of 
the turnips being retained by the particles torn off. These are then mixed with 
cut straw or wheat chaff, and, by lying an hour or two together, the fodder gets 
incorporated with the pulp, rendering it so palatable that stock eat it greedilj". 
Two lots of year-old cattle were fed : the one in the usual way — sliced t urnips 
and straw ad libitum, the other with tlie minced turnips mixed with cut straw. 
The first lot consumed, each, daily : — 
84 lbs. sliced turnips, 
1 lb. oilcake, j 
1 lb. rapecake, > broken small and mixed, 
J lb. bean meal, ) 
with a little salt, and what straw they liked. The second lot ate, each, daily : — 
50 lbs. minced turnips, 
1 lb. oilcake, 
1 lb. ra]iccakc, 
i lb. bean meal, 
and a little salt, the whole being mixed with double the bulk of cut straw or 
wheat chaff. In spring, the lot of cattle which had the mixed food were in 
as good condition and equally well-grown as the others, though they had cou- 
sunied in five mouths two tons less of roots apiece. 
