INTRODUCTORY 
In the following pages, I have endeavored to state my results 
fully enough to enable the reader to clearly understand my inter¬ 
pretation and have, at the same time, given the data so fully that 
he may draw his own conclusions, and judge whether mine are jus¬ 
tified or not. 
In this work I have had no predecessor to follow, so far as 
I know. The study of the chemical composition of timothy hay 
presented by the Pennsylvania Experiment Station is quite different 
from the present work, and I have not taken up timothy hay in 
detail, for reasons given in the proper place. The only attempt to 
determine the digestibility of the different extracts of any fodder 
that I remember to have seen mention of, was made in France. I 
do not recall the fodder or fodders studied or the scope of the in¬ 
vestigation. 
I do not know that any similar attempt to study the calorific 
value of the various portions of the fodders and the relative 
amounts of heat furnished by them, their coefficients of appro¬ 
priation, has been made. 
I have given the analytical data as fully as possible, including 
the ordinary fodder analyses of both the fodders and the feces, simi¬ 
larly their ultimate analysis, the analysis of their ashes, and what I 
have, for the purpose of this bulletin, designated as their proximate 
analysis. By proximate analysis, I mean the division of the fod¬ 
der into different portions by means of the following solvents: 8o 
per cent, alcohol, cold water, hot water with subsequent addition of 
malt extract, 1 per cent, hydric chlorid, 1 per cent, sodic hydrate 
and chlorin in the presence of water, with subsequent washing with 
water, boiling sodic hydrate, i per cent, solution, and sulfurous acid. 
The portion which resisted these successive treatments has been 
designated as residue or cellulose. 
The heat or energy, given in small calories, removed by these 
successive treatments, and the percentage of this heat value ap¬ 
propriated by the animals have been studied in detail for three of 
the fodders, alfalfa, corn fodder and the saltbush, Atriplex argeiitea. 
