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
On the value of the process for a grazing farm with but a small quantity
of plough-land, Mr. Corner, of Woodlands, Holford, Bridgewater, thus
speaks:--
My plan is, first commencing with the grazing beasts, to cut about
an equal quantity of hay and straw and mix with a sufficient
quantity of roots (mostly mangel) to well moisten the chaff; and as
the beasts advance in condition, I lessen the straw and increase
the hay, and in their further progress I mix--in addition to all
hay, chaff, and roots--from 6 to 10 lb. per day to each bullock of
barley and bean-meal, according to its size--and I have them large
sometimes. I sold last week for the London market a lot of Devon
oxen of very prime quality, averaging in weight upwards of 100 stone
imperial each.
For my horses, cows, yearlings, and oxen--the latter to be kept in
a thriving condition, and turned to grass, and kept through the
summer for Christmas, 1860--I cut nearly all straw, with a very
small quantity of hay, and this the offal of the rick. These also
have as many pulped roots as will moisten the chaff, except the
horses, and to them I give, along with bruised oats, just enough
roots to keep their bowels in a proper condition. To the two or
three-year-old beasts I give some long straw and a part chaff,
and the offal (if any) of the food of the above lots of stock.
My farm is but a small one--under 200 acres. My predecessor always
mowed nearly all the pastures for hay, which is about half the
farm, and with this scarcely ever grazed any beasts, and kept but
very few sheep. Since my occupation I scarcely ever exceed ten acres
of meadow with one field of seeds for hay. I keep from 250 to 300
large-size Leicester sheep, and graze from 20 to 25 large-size
beasts a year, with other breeding stock in proportion.
I consider the pulping of roots is better for fatting pigs than
anything else. My plan is to have a large two-hogshead vat as near
the pulping machine as possible, so as to fill it with a malt
shovel as it comes from the machine; at the same time I keep a lad
sprinkling meal (either barley or Indian corn) with the roots; and
this is all done in fifteen or twenty minutes. It is then ready for
use, to be carried to the pigs in the stalls alongside the fatting
beasts. I never could fatten a pig with profit until I used pulped
roots.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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