The Stock-Feeder's Manual: the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and feeding of live stockCameron, Charles Alexander, Sir
Science
The Stock-Feeder's Manual: the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and feeding of live stock
Cameron, Charles Alexander, Sir
Feeds; Livestock
sheds or courts from the time they are housed till late in the spring.
Young stock are best fed on good meadow hay and turnips, with a moderate
supplement of oil-cake; this, however, is expensive feeding in many
farms, and a little filling-in may be done with cheaper or more easily
obtainable stuffs. A mixture of cut chaff, with pulped mangels, is a
good substitute for the more costly hay; and particularly in the case
of animals intended for breeding or for the dairy. The roots should be
pulped, and allowed to remain until, owing to a slight fermentation,
they become warm. This change takes place in from twenty-four hours to
sixty hours, according to the temperature; but the fermentation should
not be carried farther than the earliest stage. The heated pulp should
then be thoroughly mixed with the chaff, and the compound, after an
hour or two, will be ready for use. A little chopped hay--no matter if
inferior or slightly mildewed--may be substituted for the chaff, and
turnips employed instead of the mangels, but the latter are the more
desirable roots.
Until lately, the use of oil-cake was confined to fattening animals,
but latterly it is freely given to calves, even when they are only
a month old; and there is no doubt but that it is a suitable and
economical food for store stock. It is, however, sometimes given in
excess: from half a pound to two and a half pounds daily will be
sufficient for animals under one year; and this addition to their food
will be found to exercise a beneficial influence on them when they
are placed in stalls for finishing. The experience of several eminent
breeders has proved that fattening beasts, which had in their youth
a supply of oil-cake, or its equivalent, invariably store up a larger
portion of their food than those which had been reared on hay and roots
only.
Mr. George Stodart, of Cultercullen, an Aberdeenshire farmer, describes,
in the _Irish Farmer's Gazette_, his method of rearing calves:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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