Farm Notes. 
9 
LOSS OF WEIGHT IN BARN. 
Weight as put Weight when taken Per cent of loss 
Layer in .June 15. out February 12. in weight. 
Bottom. 3778 3480 7.9 
Second. 4752 4091 13.8 
Third. 4696 4103 12.6 
Top. 4236 3663 13.5 
Average. 4365 3834 12.2 
Judging by these figures alone one would think that the 
losses in the barn had been nearly as much as in the stack. 
A study of the amounts of dry matter shows that these losses 
are almost entirely losses in weight of water. The hay as 
put in the barn contained 20.8 per cent of water; when 
taken out it contained but 12.1 per cent of water. There 
were 13,804 pounds of dry matter put into the barn and 
13,478 pounds of dry matter taken out, being a loss of but 
2.5 per cent. Since there was no waste hay this 2.5 per cent 
represents also the loss in feeding value in the barn. 
The final averages show 12.4 per cent of feeding value 
lost in the stack, while but 2.5 per cent of feeding value was 
lost from the hay that was put in the barn. This shows a 
difference of ten per cent in favor of the barn. 
In other words nine tons of hay put in the barn will jeed 
as much stock as ten tons put in the stack . 
It should be remembered that while these results indi¬ 
cate average conditions for the barn, they represent rather 
better than average figures for stacks of the first cutting of 
alfalfa in Northern Colorado. The stack under experiment, 
was put up in good shape and had a chance to settle well 
before much rain fell upon it, while the season was in gen¬ 
eral favorable for hay in stack. These figures may be said 
to represent the least losses that one should expect with the 
first cutting. Had the same test been made in 1895 a ver y 
different story would result. That year at least one-third of 
the dry matter in the stack was lost. We made an extended 
test of the feeding value of this injured stack hay as com¬ 
pared with similar hay from the barn. It was found that 
the sheep eating the two lots of hay made exactly the same 
gain for the entire five months of the test, but for every two 
tons of hay from the barn we had to draw three tons from 
the stack, and this was in addition to the large amounts of 
worthless hay on the tops and bottoms of the stack. In that 
year therefore44 tonsof hay put into the barn yielded as much 
feed as 10 tons in the stack. 
Of course this is an extreme case, but the average loss of 
all years for Northern Colorado is probably not less than a 
