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‘1 Sepr., 1897.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 201 
Sweet v. Sour Whey for Fattening Pigs. 
Tar Scottish Farmer, quoting from Farming (Toronto), says:—‘ Professor 
G. E. Day has been carrying on an experiment in fattening hogs with sweet as 
against sour whey, the results of which are somewhat surprising. It is 
commonly thought that sour whey has little or no feeding value; but the results 
of this experiment, which was repeated with another lot of hogs, go to show 
that its feeding value is practically equal to that of sweet whey. In August 
Professor Day chose nine uniform hogs, and separated them into three groups 
of three each. Group 1 was given a ration of meal and water; Group 2, meal 
and sweet whey; and Group 3, mealand sour whey. They were fed these rations 
from 22nd August to 16th October—a period of fifty-five days. The meal was 
moistened with the water, sweet or sour whey, as the case may be; about 2 lb. 
of whey was used to 1 lb. of meal. On 15th October a second experiment was 
commenced similar to the first with another lot of hogs, and continued for 
forty-two days. The results of the second experiment were very similar to 
those in the previous one. ‘Taking an average of the two experiments, 
Professor Day found that the hogs in Group 1 (water) made a daily gain of 
1-43 lb. live weight for each hog; Group 2 (sweet whey), 1°76 lb.; and Group 
3 (sour whey), 1°78 Ib. Itis too soon to draw conclusions, however, though 
the results of the two experiments correspond very closely. ‘This work will be 
continued again next season. These experiments go to show that 100 Ib. of 
whey (sweet and sour) has a feeding value equal to 13°31 lb. of the meal used, 
and, at the prices paid for grain, the value of the whey would be about 8 cents. 
Professor Day does not say in his report how sour the whey was or how it was 
handled. Whey allowed to sour in cans or something of that sort, will not get 
so rotten sour as it does in many of the whey tanks at cheese factories, and thus 
misleading results may be obtained from such experiments. An acid test might 
be made of the whey as taken from factory tanks, also of whey that stands in 
cans for twenty-four hours after it comes to the farm, and more definite 
knowledge obtained upon the subject.” 
