106 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[Maech 
young chicks, at first, is stale bread crumbs, 
moistened (not wet) in fresh, sweet milk. 
No water should be given until the birds are 
at least two or three weeks old. Until the 
chicks become fully feathered, but little corn 
meal should be fed, and that well cooked, the 
main dependence being placed on stale bread 
and fresh milk, “Cottage Cheese,” cracked 
wheat, rice, oaten grits, etc., which are most 
excellent, and not so heating as corn meal. 
jJmv'iv Jersey, is “somewhat” of a State, 
though making little noise in the world— 
perhaps because wedged in between the great 
Empire and Keystone States, with the two 
greatest cities of the country, New York and 
Philadelphia, close upon its borders to divert 
attention. In area it covers five and one-tliird 
million acres (8,320 square miles). It stands 
exactly in the middle as to population, there 
being 18 States having one million inhabit¬ 
ants and upwards, and 18- States with less 
than nine hundred thousand, New Jersey 
having 906,096, or 108 to each square mile— 
about 5 7 /s acres to each inhabitant.—The 
assesment of taxable property just completed 
amounts to $527,451,222, an increase of 9‘/ 3 
million dollars during the year. The real 
property exceeds one billion dollars, as the 
assessed valuation in some counties is scarce¬ 
ly 25 per cent, and in few exceeds 50 per cent. 
This amounts to an average of over $1,100 
for every man, woman, and child in the 
State. There are 21 counties, the wealthiest, 
Essex, assessed for $108,494,000, and the 
poorest, Cape May Co., for only $3,525,625. 
A Grain and Stock Barn. 
In the accompanying engravings we pre¬ 
sent the bam recently erected by Prof. S. 
Johnson at the State Agricultural College 
Farm, near Lansing, Mich. The building is 
for storing hay and 
grain, with base¬ 
ment so arranged 
that a good paid of 
it may be used for 
keeping live stock. 
Figure 1 shows the 
front elevation of 
the bam in perspec¬ 
tive, and the rear 
end and other side 
are given in figure 
2. With these en¬ 
gravings very little 
is required to be 
said as to construc¬ 
tion of the barn and 
general appearance. 
The plan of the 
basement is shown 
in figure 3. In 
this there is provision for two rows of 
cattle stalls. A silo, 15 by 18 feet, for the 
preserving of .grain fodder, occupies one 
corner. The two small squares, 4 by 4 feet, 
show the position of ventilators, which also 
serve as shutes for the descent of hay, straw, 
etc. The second floor is seen in figure 4, 
with its drive-way 14 by 80 feet running the 
whole length near the center of the barn, 
with a tight floor above with the exception 
of 16 feet. On one side is a large bay going 
down to the basement floor. The granary, 
13 by 22 feet, and 10 feet high, occupies one 
end of the wheat mow; it is ceiled with 
matched oak. The mow is 13 by 58 feet to 
the top of the granary, where it extends the 
whole 80 feet, or length of the bam. There 
are also two feet on the mow side of the 
bam of the same size as those in the bay. 
The position of the stairway to the basement 
is shown at one end of the bay, and by the 
side of the drive-way near the entrance doors. 
Professor Johnson, in his notes accompany¬ 
ing the architect’s plans says : “The drive- 
floor rims the long 
way of the barn, to 
give room for the 
machine and straw- 
carrier inside when 
threshing. The 
grain will be stored 
in the mow and 
above the drive- 
floor on the south 
end. In threshing, 
the straw - carrier 
will convey the 
straw to the floor 
over the north end 
of drive-floor, from 
which it will be 
distributed to the 
bay so as to keep all 
straw inside. The 
mow will then be. 
clear to receive com, straw, and other forage 
crops. The cost of the barn, with two coats of 
paint, will be about eighteen hundred dollars.” 
Watering- House Plants. —There is 
but one time for watering plants, that is— 
when tfley need it. If the soil in a pot is 
Fig. 1.— FRONT ELEVATION OF THE BARN. 
already moist, do not give it more water. If 
the earth is very dry and packed hard, plunge 
the pot in a pail of water and let it soak. 
Fodder Rations and Feeding Values. 
BY DR. M. MILES, DIRECTOR Of EXPERIMENTS AT “HOUGH¬ 
TON FARM,”N. T. 
What is the relative value of corn meal, 
linseed-cake meal, and cotton-seed-cake meal 
as cattle food ? The answer to this question 
involves a consideration of the principles 
that are applied in determining the value of 
all foods, and the relative influence of their 
constituents in the varied processes of animal 
nutrition. Twenty-five years ago we were 
told that the nitrogen of foods was the mea¬ 
sure of their nutritive value, and tables of 
food equivalents on this basis were published. 
According to this method cotton-seed cake 
would have a higher value than linseed cake 
and the latter would be decidedly better 
than com meal. In this plan of determining 
the relative value of foods it was assumed 
that their nitrogenous constituents were the 
only substances that could aid in the process 
of nutrition, and they were therefore called 
“ flesh formers,” while the non-nitrogenous 
constituents, which were supposed to serve 
as fuel to keep up the animal heat, were called 
“combustive,” or “heat-producing” elements. 
This theory was for a long time a popular 
one, as it seemed to give a very simple ex¬ 
planation of the physiology of digestion and 
of the economy and relative value of foods. 
It was, however, a mere assumption that 
failed to stand the test of experience, and the 
carefully conducted experiments on animals, 
that were made by physiologists, furnished 
abundant proofs that it was not true. A 
simple illustration of the failure of this old 
theory to account for observed facts is given. 
In the feeding experiments that were con¬ 
ducted at Rothamsted, by Lawes and Gilbert, 
on an extended scale, it was found that the 
comparative value of ordinary cattle foods 
depended more upon the proportion of di¬ 
gestible non-nitrogenous substances than 
upon their richness in nitrogen. From these 
experiments and from other special physio¬ 
logical investigations we now know that the 
non-nitrogenous constituents of foods have 
important parts to perform in the strictly 
