1882.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
53 
Water for Live Stock. 
BY DR. M. MILES, “HOUGHTON FARM," MOUNTAIN- 
YILLE, N. Y. 
The importance of an abundant supply of 
water for the animals of the farm, at all 
times and under all circumstances, as an 
essential condition of the healthy and effi¬ 
cient performance of the functions of animal 
life, is too often entirely overlooked. The 
analyses of the carcass and offal of oxen, 
sheep, and pigs, made at Rothamsted, by 
Lawes and Gilbert, in their investigation of 
the composition of the increase of these ani¬ 
mals, in fattening, shows that the percentage 
of water in the fasted live weight of the en¬ 
tire body, is as follows : 
Water, per cent. I Water, per cent. 
Fat Calf.63.0 | Half-fat Old Sheep —50.3 
Half-fat Ox. 51.5 [ Fat Sheep.43.3 
Fat Ox.45.5 | Extra-fat Sheep.35.2 
Fat Lamb.47.7 I Store Pig.55.0 
Store Sheep.57.3 | Fat Pig.41.4 
From these figures it will be seen that 
water constitutes more than one half the 
live weight of the average animal of the 
farm, fat animals containing somewhat 
less, and lean animals considerably more. 
In man, physiologists estimate water to 
constitute from a / 3 to 8 / 4 of the weight 
of the body. In the functions of nutri¬ 
tion and excretion, the water of the system 
performs an important part. The food taken 
into the stomach must be in the soluble form 
before it can be taken up by the absorbents 
and transferred to the blood, which in its 
circulation throughout the body carries the 
elements of nutrition to the various tissues, 
where the materials required for their par¬ 
ticular use are appropriated. But this trans¬ 
formation of the food into substances that 
can be assimilated and made use of by the 
tissues, is not a simple one ; it must be acted 
upon in its course through the organs of 
digestion by various fluid secretions from the 
time it is introduced into the mouth until it 
is received into the circulation. The work 
performed by the system in this elaboration 
of nutritive materials cannot be fully appre¬ 
ciated without reference to details. The 
saliva is secreted by the glands of the mouth 
to moisten the food, so that it can be readily 
swallowed. The specific action of the saliva 
upon the composition of the food, we cannot 
now stop to discuss. The quantity of saliva 
secreted by animals is surprising. Experi¬ 
ments by Lassainge show that 100 lbs. of dry 
hay fed to a horse required a secretion of 400 
lbs. of saliva ; 100 lbs. of oats required a se¬ 
cretion of 113 lbs. of saliva; while 100 lbs. of 
green food required but 49 lbs. of saliva td 
prepare it for swallowing. Concentrated 
foods, like grain, therefore, seem to make a 
smaller demand upon the glands for the secre¬ 
tion of saliva than the coarser foods like hay ; 
and dry hay imposes a much greater tax upon 
the salivary glands than green feed. Green 
feed has not only an advantage over dry, in 
the amount of saliva required to prepare it 
for digestion, but the results of the German 
feeding experiments seem to indicate that it 
is much more readily digested. M. Colin 
estimates the saliva secreted by a horse when 
fed on dry food, at 92.6 lbs. in 24 hours, and 
the quantity secreted by a cow under similar 
conditions at 123.5 lbs. in 24 hours. Now, if 
the blood in the system is estimated at from 
50 to 75 lbs., the secretion of saliva alone must 
have a marked influence upon its distribution 
in the system as well as upon its composition. 
The saliva is, however, but one of the many 
secretions that are required to prepare the 
food for the process of assimilation. When 
the food enters the stomach the gastric juice 
is elaborated to transform the albuminoids 
into soluble peptones, and then as it passes 
into the intestine, an emulsion of the fatty 
materials, and the conversion of starch into 
sugar, take place through the influence of 
the pancreatic and intestinal secretions. The 
bile is also secreted in considerable quantity 
to perform its peculiar functions, and the 
absorbents are actively at work to transfer 
the nutritive materials to the blood as fast 
as they are prepared by the digestive fluids. 
heat must be kept up so long as life lasts, and 
to do this, either a larger amount of fuel must 
be consumed, or the fire will be fed by accu¬ 
mulated or stored up fuel in the form of flesh, 
and the animal grows poorer. It is cheaper, 
as far as it can be, to keep up the animal heat 
by shelter than by food. A shivering, suffer¬ 
ing animal is not in a profitable condition. 
There is also an appeal to the humane side of 
our nature in this lack of comfort. Provide 
good shelter from the weather for all farm 
animals, for it pays in more ways than one. 
Self-Cleaning Sheep Troughs. 
As the soluble nutritive materials are taken 
up from the intestinal canal by the vessels 
that perform this function, a fresh draft is 
made upon the blood by the digestive organs 
for the elaboration of their peculiar secre¬ 
tions, so that a rapid interchange of fluids 
is taking place between the intestinal canal 
and the blood during the process of digestion. 
The rapidity with which this interchange 
of fluids takes place, is perhaps best indicated 
by the amount of chyle and lymph passing 
through the thoracic duct, which, in rumi¬ 
nants, as shown by M. Colin, is from eighty 
to nearly two hundred pounds in twenty-four 
hours. In a cow, weighing 1,000 lbs., the 
principal secretions and excretions may be 
estimated as follows ■ Lbs. in 24 Hours. 
Saliva (dry food).123.5 
Gastric Secretions .100.0 
Pancreatic Secretions.. 7.25 
Bile. . 20.00 
Exhalation from the Lungs. 10.00 
Perspiration. 20.00 
Urine.21 75 
Total.302.50 
From this it would appear that nearly one- 
third of the weight of the body is separated 
from the blood in the form of secretions re¬ 
quired in preparing the food for the proces¬ 
ses of nutrition, and in excretions of waste 
materials that are of no further use in the 
system. From this enumeration of some of 
the leading activities of the animal economy, 
it must be seen that the amount of work 
performed by the internal organs of the body 
is not inconsiderable, even when the animal 
is apparently at rest, and that a supply of 
water to maintain the equilibrium of these 
fluids and keep them in proper proportion to 
the denser tissues, is of great importance. 
It will also be readily seen that the supply 
of water should be constant, or at least fre¬ 
quently repeated, to secure uniformity in the 
fluidity of the blood and the various secre¬ 
tions. Water must be recognized as a food, 
and it should be given with the same regu¬ 
larity as other food. Magendie found that 
dogs, supplied with water alone, lived from 
six to ten days longer than those that 
were deprived of both food and water; so 
that water has undoubtedly an important 
function to perform in the system, aside from 
the dilution of other nutritious substances. 
The addition of green feed, in some form, 
to the winter ration of our farm animals, will 
be found advantageous for many reasons, 
and the amount of water required by them 
as drink will by this means be diminished. 
"Winter Exposure of Eive Stock:.— 
The importance of giving proper shelter to 
all farm animals can not be too strongly 
urged. Looked at simply in the view of dol¬ 
lars and cents, it does not pay to have the 
sheep, pigs, cattle, or horses, left out of doors 
in the piercing winter winds. The animal 
BY L. D. SNOOK, YATES CO., N. Y. 
One of the annoyances connected with 
feeding grain to sheep and other stock is the 
Fig. 1.— A REMOVABLE FEED TROUGH. 
liability of the trough to become dirty, when 
it must either be upset, or cleaned out with 
a bit of board, broom, or wisp of coarse fod¬ 
der, as most convenient. Also troughs that 
are from necessity left out doors during win¬ 
ter, become partly 
filled with snow 
many times each 
week, consuming 
a great deal of 
time to clean 
them. To avoid 
all this trouble and 
vexation I have _. 
, , ,, . . Fig. 2.— TROUGH INVERTED, 
planned the fol¬ 
lowing self-cleaning troughs that are cheap 
and easily made. The simplest plan is shown 
in fig. 1; the trough is hung at each end on 
wooden pins, t, t, 
attached to the 
plank-post. The 
ends of the trough 
project upward 
about ten inches; 
near the upper 
end of each is a 
half - inch hole, 
that corresponds 
with one made in 
the post; by pass¬ 
ing a loosely fit- 
Fig. 3.— HINGED FORM. 
ting pin through these holes the trough is 
firmly held in position. During stormy 
weather or at any time, by turning the trough 
bottom up, as in fig. 2, and inserting the pin 
atn, the trough is 
cleaned from all 
dirt, kept dry and 
free from rain, 
snow, or ice. Posts 
may be, driven in 
the ground or con¬ 
nected at bottom 
by a scantling as 
desired. With the 
trough shown in 
fig. 3, pins are dis- TE0UGn folded over. 
pensed with. It is constructed by cutting a 
Y-shaped notch in the top of the plank post, 
in which rests the end of the trough. An iron 
hinge, e, at each end connects the top of the 
post and trough. At any time, simply raise 
the opposite side of the trough, and fold it 
