8 
COLORADO EXPERIMENT STATION 
the most important portion in all cases, though they showed a great dif¬ 
ference in value in the cases of the different fodders. In these, the alfalfa 
and the saltbush, the amounts of alcoholic extract digested by the 
lots of sheep in five days chance to be the same, but the energy ap¬ 
propriated by the lot which received alfalfa was very much greater, 
nearly twice as great as that appropriated by the lot that received 
saltbush. It will be recalled that it was stated that there was so big 
a difference in the character of the carbohydrates of these two plants 
that it could not in any way be ascribed to errors ’of manipulation. 
We here find, by another method, that the alcoholic extract of the 
saltbush yielded only a little more than one-half of the energy that 
the corresponding alfalfa extract yielded. This difference might be 
due to the different quantities of proteids in the two extracts, but it 
is not, provided that they have even approximately the same value in 
the two fodders, for they received and digested a larger quantity of 
proteids in the form of saltbush hay than they did as alfalfa hay, 
showing that, viewed from the standpoint of fuel value, the difference 
very probably lies in the character of the carbohydrates. While it is 
admitted that little is known of the character of the proteids dissolved 
out of these or any other fodders by alcohol, we have as good a guide for 
our judgment in this case as we have in others pertaining to the 
character of fodders, i. e., the animals digested not only a larger 
quantity of nitrogenous matter when fed on saltbush but assimilated 
a larger proportion of that that they received. We will not consider 
all of the extracts in this manner lest too many similar statements 
should obscure rather than emphasize the facts intended to be brought 
out, so we will only consider the muriatic acid extract and the residue 
or cellulose. The former, muriatic acid extract, furnished very much 
more digestible dry matter in the case of the saltbush th'an in that of 
the alfalfa, one-third more, but its coefficient of digestibility was ma¬ 
terially lower, two-thirds that of the alfalfa, and we find the energy 
almost exactly one-half of the amount yielded in the case of alfalfa. 
The proteids in this extract of these two fodders were nearly the 
same, both in regard to their quantity and digesibility, showing again 
that the difference was probably due to the character of the carbo¬ 
hydrates. The only other and last big feature of these two fodders 
that we will mention will be the cellulose which, owing to the method 
of preparation, contains very little nitrogen, no ready formed sugars 
or subsances soluble in alcohol, water, muriatic acid, caustic sodic or 
removable by chlorin, in other words, the soluble substances and those 
portions of the woody tissue capable of being broken up and removed 
by these agents had already been eliminated and though this residue 
would appear to be of but little value as food for the animal, we find 
it always one of the first three portions in importance. We would 
probably, without definite knoweldge to the contrary, not only con¬ 
sider this portion of but little value, but would expect to find it of 
nearly equal value in all cases, which is no nearer the truth than the 
former. In these two cases, we find that over one-half of the alfalfa 
cellulose is digestible while less than three-tenths of the saltbush 
