The Stock-Feeder's Manual Part 6

1. A certain amount of warmth is an indispensable condition for the maintenance of the life of animals.

2. The internal heat of the bodies of animals is supplied by the chemical combination which takes place between the oxygen of the atmospheric air which they inspire and certain of the const.i.tuents (carbon and hydrogen) of the food which they consume, or, to speak more accurately, of the tissues of their bodies, which are formed out of their food. It is very much in the same way in which our houses are heated by the burning of coal, turf, or wood in their fire-places, since the heat derived in the latter case is obtained from a similar source as in the former one--namely, by the union of the oxygen of the air with the carbon and hydrogen of the fuel. The only real difference between the two kinds of combustion is, that in respiration the process is conducted with an extreme degree of slowness, whilst in the ordinary fire the combinations take place rapidly, and the heat being evolved in a much shorter time is proportionately the more intense.

3. The temperature of the external parts of the animal body varies with the nature and quant.i.ty of the food supplied to it, and also depends upon the state of the weather and the character of the protection afforded to it.

The colder the air, the greater will be the quant.i.ty of food required, and the more complete the shelter. In other words, a diminution of temperature, no matter how caused, will necessitate an increased amount of food and more perfect shelter, in order to maintain at the proper degree of heat the fluids of the body. It is only the external parts of the body that become cold: so long as the animal is in health its blood always maintains the same degree of temperature; but in cold weather the blood is subjected to a greater cooling power than it is in warm weather, and this cooling power it can only resist by taxing more extensively the heat-producing resources of the body.

4. Exposure to wet, even in warm weather, will tend to reduce the temperature of the body, since the conversion of water into vapor can only be effected at the expense of heat, which heat must be in great part extracted from the body of the animal itself.

5. No possible increase of food, however nutritious it may be, can suffice to keep up the due warmth and healthy condition of the animal frame in winter, if shelter from cold and rain be not simultaneously effected. On the contrary, an animal well protected from the winter blasts will require much less food than if it were placed in an exposed position. The reason of this is, that the amount of food which an animal exposed to great cold consumes to maintain the temperature of its body would, under opposite conditions, be stored up in the form of permanent "increase"--beef or mutton for the butcher, in fact.

The fat-forming const.i.tuents of the food of stock are in no case converted into permanent fat, except when they exceed in quant.i.ty the amount required to keep up the internal heat of the animal; but when this is constantly reduced by exposure to a wintry temperature, the food becomes insufficient for even that purpose, no matter how much aliment is given. What, then, must not be the condition of the unfortunate animals whose fate it is to be the property of a farmer who neither shelters them from the weather nor provides them with a sufficient quant.i.ty of nourishing food!

_Milch Cows._--When dairy-farming is conducted on pure pastures, the cows are altogether dependent upon the gra.s.ses; and in winter, the animals suffer much from scarcity of food. This is the very worst system of cow-keeping, but it is prevalent amongst many small farmers in Ireland, and is to be met with even in England and Scotland. I am strongly of opinion that it would be far more economical to keep cows (and other cattle) altogether in the house, and feed them with cut gra.s.s, than to allow them to remain out altogether in the field. There are several disadvantages resulting from the depasturing of cows. In the warm weather, the animals are greatly annoyed by the attacks of flies: there is a considerable waste of muscle, caused by the movements of the animals whilst in search of their food; and the excrements of the animals and their footmarks injure a large portion of the gra.s.s. It may be somewhat troublesome and expensive to cut the gra.s.s, and convey it from the field to the house; but the labor and the cost will be more than repaid by the greatly-increased yield of food. A gra.s.s-field, mowed, will produce from 20 to 30 per cent. more food than it would if it were trampled upon and soiled by cattle. Exercise for an hour or two in the cool of the evening, or early in the morning (during the hot weather), will be quite sufficient to keep the animals in health. This may be taken in a field, better in a paddock, best of all in a roomy yard. When cattle are supplied with cut gra.s.s, or clover, care should be taken not to give it to them when very wet, for otherwise there is danger of the excessively moist herbage producing the _hoove_. Neither should large quant.i.ties of the green food be given to them--the supply should be "little and often." Should the food be too succulent, the addition of a little straw will correct its laxative effects. When the stock is about pa.s.sing from the winter keep to summer food, the transition should be gradual; a well-made compound of straw or hay with gra.s.s (natural or artificial) is much relished by cows. A supply of good water is absolutely necessary; but sufficient attention to this important point is seldom given. Cooked food is well adapted for milch cows. Mangels, kohl-rabi, and cabbages are each of them better food than turnips, as the latter is apt to impart a disagreeable flavour to the b.u.t.ter. Three feeds in the day is a sufficient number for cows. The first meal should be early in the morning, and may consist of roots, mixed with straw or hay. Some feeders prefer using dry fodder, or cooked food of some kind, and not raw roots. The second meal is given at mid-day, and the third in the evening. The daily allowance of roots varies from 2 to 8 stones, depending upon the quant.i.ties of other foods used. Mr. Horsfall's diet is as follows:--Hay, 9 lbs.; rape-cake, 6 lbs.; malt-combs, 1 lb.; bran, 1 lb.; roots, 28 lbs. These substances are mixed and cooked, and the animals receive them in a warm state.

In addition to this food, Mr. Horsfall's cows get bean-meal--a cow in full milk 2 lbs., others from 1/2 lb. to 1-1/2 lbs.; cost per week per cow, 8s. 7d.[21] Mr. Alc.o.c.k, of Skipton, feeds his cows as follows:--Raw mangels, 20 lbs.; carob beans, 3 lbs.; bran and malt-combs, 1-3/4 lbs.; bean-meal, 3-1/2 lbs.; rape-cake, 3 lbs.; per diem. A steamed mixture of wheat and bean straws and sh.e.l.ls of oats _ad libitum_. Oats, to the extent of 2 or 3 lbs. daily, are an excellent food for cows.

An important point in dairy economics is the feeding of the cows at _regular_ intervals. If the usual time for the feed be allowed to pa.s.s, the animals are almost certain to become very uneasy--to _worry_; and every feeder knows, or ought to know, that a fretting beast will neither fatten nor yield milk satisfactorily. The cow-house ought to be kept as clean as possible; and the excreta, therefore, should be removed several times a day.

Mr. Harvey, of Glasgow, has probably one of the largest dairies in the world. His cow byres, 56 yards long, and from 12 to 24 feet wide--according as one or two rows of cows are to be accommodated--stand closely packed, the whole surface of the ground being thus covered by a kind of roof. From 900 to 1,000 cows are constantly in milk. They are fed during winter partly on steamed turnips (7 tons being steamed daily in order to give one meal daily to 900 cows), partly on coa.r.s.e hay, of which, as of straw, they get between 20 and 30 lbs. a day each. They are also fed on draff, of which they receive half a bushel daily each; on Indian corn meal, of which they have 3 lbs. daily each; and on pot-ale, of which they receive three times a day nearly as much as they will consume, _i.e._, from 6 to 10 gallons daily. During the summer they are let out, a byreful at a time, for half a day to gra.s.s, and on coming in receive their spent malt and still liquor, and hay in addition. They are managed, cleaned, and fed by two men to each byre holding about 100 cows. The milking is done three times a day, by women who take charge of 13 cows in full milk, or double that number in half milk, apiece.

Between 4 and 5 o'clock a.m. (taking the winter management), the byres are cleaned out, and the cows receive a "big shovelful" of draff apiece, and half their steamed turnips and meal, and a "half stoupful,"

(probably 2 gallons) of pot-ale. They are milked very early. At 7 they receive their fodder-straw or hay. At 10 they get a "full stoupful"

(probably 3 or 4 gallons) of pot-ale. They are milked at noon. At 2 p.m., or thereabouts, they are foddered again, and at 4 p.m. receive the same food as at the morning meal. They are again milked at 5 to 6, cleaned out and left till morning. The average produce is stated to be 2 gallons a day per cow.

Mrs. Scott, of Weekston, Peebles, who keeps one of the best managed dairy farms in the United Kingdom, thus conducts her operations in the winter:--At 6 o'clock in the morning the cows are well wiped or scrubbed, have their bedding removed, and receive each about 4 or 5 lbs.

of straw. At 8 o'clock the cows are milked, and Mrs. Scott examines each to ascertain whether or not the milk-maid has left any fluid in the udder--and woe betide the careless maid if her work has been carelessly done! At 10 o'clock a barrowful of turnips is divided amongst three cows, and when these roots are not available, a quant.i.ty of peas or bean meal, with a pint of cold water, takes their place. At 1 o'clock the cows are allowed out to be watered, and during their absence from the byre it is thoroughly cleansed and ventilated. When the state of the weather prevents the cows from being turned out, they receive twice a day a handful of oatmeal diffused throughout three pints of water--a handful of salt being given in the first of these drinks. When the cows return to the byre, they receive each about 4 or 5 lbs. of straw, and at 4 or 5 o'clock an evening meal of turnips equal to their morning feed.

At 8 o'clock a "windling" of meadow hay is given to each pair of cows, the quant.i.ty being always regulated according to the requirements of each cow. The cows upon calving receive, in addition to this allowance of hay, half a pailful of boiled turnips, mixed with a quart of peas or bean-meal. This mess is given in a lukewarm state. Mrs. Scott's system may be thus epitomised: Regularity in feeding; sufficient but not excessive food; regularity in milking; and minute attention to cleanliness and ventilation.

_Stall-feeding._--What becomes of the 90 per cent. of the weight of the non-nitrogenous const.i.tuents of the food of the sheep, and of the 80 per cent. of that of the nutriment of the pig, which they consume but do not store up? I have already partly answered this question. This portion of the food is chiefly expended in the production of the heat with which the high temperature of the animal's body is maintained. Part of it, no doubt, pa.s.ses unchanged through its body, either owing to its indigestibility, or to its being given in excess. The quant.i.ty of non-nitrogenous matters consumed by a man is influenced greatly by the temperature of the air which he habitually breathes, and by the nature of the artificial covering of his body; there may be other conditions at present unknown to us, but these are amongst the chief ones. Now, as there is sufficient reason to lead us to believe that the consumption of carbonaceous food by the lower animals is influenced in the same way by the temperature of the medium in which they exist, the question naturally suggests itself, would it not be cheaper to maintain the heat of the animal by burning the carbon of cheap coal or turf outside its body, than by consuming the carbon of costly fat within it? The answer to this question is not so simple as at first sight it appears to be. We must not consider that, because 10 lbs. weight of carbon, as coal, costs but a penny, whilst an equal weight of the same element in starch costs twenty pence, heat may be furnished to a fattening animal twenty times cheaper by the combustion of coal than by that of starch. No doubt the amount of heat evolved by the conversion of a pound-weight of carbon into carbonic acid is the same, whether it be a const.i.tuent of starch or of coal; but the application of the heat so produced is less under our control in the latter case. All the heat evolved during the combustion of the starch within the animal's body is made use of; whilst a very large proportion of that developed by the combustion of coal in a furnace cannot in practice be applied to the purpose of heating the animal's body.

It is only the handiwork of the Creator which is perfect, and no machine constructed by the skill of man, for the direction of force, can rival that wondrous heat-producing, force-directing mechanism--the animal organism. According to Dumas, the combustion of about 2-1/2 lbs. of carbon in a steam-engine is required to generate sufficient force to convey a man from the level of the sea to the summit of Mont Blanc; but a man will ascend the mountain in two days, and burn in his mechanism only half a pound of carbon. There is no machine in which heat and force are more completely made available than the animal organism; and were it not--thanks to the influence of antediluvian sunshine--that the carbon of fuel in these countries is so very much cheaper than the carbon of food, there is no doubt but that the cheapest mode of keeping an animal warm would be to allow it to burn its carbon within its body. As the matter stands, however, there is no question as to the advisability of keeping fattening animals in a warm place. If the temperature of the stall be equal to that of the animal's body there will be less food consumed in the increase of its fat; because less of the fat-forming materials will be expended in the production of heat.

In this sense, therefore, heat is an equivalent to food, but only within certain limits; because heat is developed in large quant.i.ty within the animal body independently of the temperature of the air. There is, therefore, no object to be attained by having the stalls heated beyond 70 or 80 degrees. Indeed, it is to be questioned whether or not stalls artificially heated are ever properly ventilated. If they be not, the health of the animal will suffer, and its appet.i.te--so essential a point in fattening stock--will become impaired. We may conclude--firstly, that animals, when fattening, should be kept at a temperature not under 70 degrees nor above 90 degrees Fahrenheit; secondly, that the mode of heating must be such that there is as little wasteful combustion of fuel as is possible under the circ.u.mstances; and, lastly, that no motives of economy of fuel should prevent the feeding places from being thoroughly ventilated.

Stall-feeding is not so extensively carried on in Ireland as it is in Great Britain. There is a general impression that it does not pay in the former country; but if such be the case, it is simply owing to the want of skill on the part of the Irish feeders.

The cattle intended for stall-feeding should be removed (if out) from the field in October, and put into the house, or court, or crib, or hammel, as the case may be. They are fed upon roots, straw, hay, grain, and artificial food. The greatest skill is required in their treatment.

It is a nice point to determine which foods are the most economical, and also to ascertain in what foods excessive proportions of certain nutritive elements exist. Sufficient food should be given; but any approach to waste should be avoided. Three feeds a day are usually given, and should be supplied at the same hours each day. For about two weeks the animals are furnished with white turnips _ad libitum_; but after the expiration of that time they receive Swedish turnips, straw, and grain, or oil-cake. Late in the season mangels will replace turnips.

Almost every extensive feeder now uses oil-cakes in large quant.i.ties; but when oats are low in price, they will in general be found a cheap equivalent for a large proportion of the oil-cake. Different feeders have different dietaries, and the nature of the aliments supplied to fattening stock depends very much upon the market prices of food-stuffs, and the locality in which the feeding-house is situated. The following dietaries are but examples of the methods of feeding adopted in different districts and by different persons:--

Mr. McCombie, of Tillyfour, fattens from 300 to 400 beasts annually, and obtained for them in 1861 35 per head. He never exceeds 4 lbs. of oil-cake per diem, nor 2 lbs. of bruised oats, for each beast. He gives as much turnip and straw as they can consume. He realises 12 per acre in feeding on Aberdeen and Swedish turnips.

"For fatting cattle," says Mr. Edmonds, of Cirencester, "I should recommend two parts hay and one part straw, or in forward animals three parts hay and one part straw cut in chaff. Those of average size will eat somewhere about five bushels per day, with 4 lbs. to 5 lbs.

oil-cake, and half a peck of mixed meal, barley and peas, or beans, and, if cheap, a proportion of wheat also, to be increased to one peck per day in a month or six weeks after they have come to stall, the oil-cake and meal to be boiled in water for half-an-hour or three-quarters, and thrown in the form of rich soup over the chaff, and well mixed, to which add a little salt."

Colonel M'Douall, of Logan, Wigtonshire, gives 3 lbs. of bean-meal and 3 lbs. of cut straw cooked together, and 84 lbs. of Swedish turnips.

According to the researches of Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert, an ox weighing 1,400 lbs. ought to gain 20 lbs. weekly when fed under cover with 8 lbs.

of crushed oil-cake, 13 lbs. of chopped clover hay, and 47 lbs. of turnips. The chemical const.i.tuents (in a dried state) of this allowance are as follows:--

Ounces.

Fat-formers, or heat givers 232 Flesh-formers 55 Mineral matter 29

_Cost of Maintaining Animals._--The animal mechanism, which exhibits the least tendency to fatten, is the most costly to keep in repair, in relation to the work performed by it. If, for example, a sheep store up in its increase one-fifth of its food, then the remaining four-fifths are expended in preserving it alive, and their cost represents, so to speak, the expense of preserving the animal's body in repair. If another sheep store up only one-tenth of its food, then the cost of its maintenance may be said to be double that of the animal which retains the larger proportion of its nutriment in the form of flesh. Of course in both cases the value of the manure will to a great extent compensate for the cost of the food expended in merely keeping the animal alive; but that does not affect the proposition, that the less food expended by an animal in carrying on its vital functions the more valuable is it as a "meat-manufacturing machine." From the moment it is brought into the world until it is "ripe" for the shambles, an animal should steadily increase in weight: every week that it does not store up a portion of its food in permanent increase is the loss of a week's food to the feeder; for all the fodder consumed during that time by the animal is, so to speak, devoted to its own private purposes. Sheep overcrowded on pastures, milch cows on "short commons," calves kept on bulky innutritious food, are all so many sources of positive loss to the feeder--and as many proofs that he who aspires to be a successful producer of meat, must, in one respect at least, be a devout believer in the doctrine of Progressive Development.

_Cooking and Bruising Food._--The cooking, or the otherwise preparing, of the food of the domesticated animals is a subject which until recently was completely ignored by the vast majority of stock feeders.

It is now, however, beginning to attract a fair amount of attention; and no doubt ere long the best modes of treating the food of cattle will be discovered.

As might be expected from our limited experience of the subject, there exists considerable difference of opinion relative to the proper method of cooking cattle food; and there are many very extensive feeders who object to the plan altogether, and contend that as the food of the inferior animals is naturally supplied to them in a raw condition, it would be quite unnatural to give it to them in a cooked state.

Whatever difference of opinion there may be with regard to the propriety of cooking the food of stock, we believe there ought not to be a doubt as to the desirability of mechanically treating the harder kinds of feeding stuff. It is quite evident that a horse fed upon hard grains of oats and wiry fibres of uncut hay or straw must expend no inconsiderable proportion of his motive power in the process of mastication. After a hard day's work of eight or ten hours he has before him the laborious task of reducing to a pulp from 12 lbs. to 20 lbs. weight of exceedingly hard and tough vegetable matter; and as this operation is carried on during the hours which should be devoted to rest, the repose of the animal is to some extent interfered with. Indeed, it not unfrequently happens that a horse, after a hard day's work, is too tired to chew his food properly; he consequently bolts his oats, a large proportion of which, as a matter of course, pa.s.ses unchanged through the animal's body.

In order to render fully effective the motive power of the horse, it is absolutely necessary to pay attention to the condition, as well as to the quant.i.ty and quality of his nutriment. The force wasted by a horse in the comminution of his food, when composed of whole oats and uncut hay and straw, cannot, at the lowest estimate, be less than that which he expends in an hour of ordinary work, such as, for example, in ploughing. The preparation of his food by means of water or steam power, or even by animal motive power, would economise by at least 50 per cent.

the labor expended in its mastication; and this would be equivalent to nearly half a day's work in each week, and, consequently, a clear gain of so much labor to the owner of the animal. In the present time of water-power and steam-power corn-mills, one man is able to grind the flour necessary for the support of several thousand men; in early ages the labor of one person in the grinding of wheat served but to supply the wants of twenty others. In both cases machinery was employed for reducing the grain to flour; but in the one case, the mechanisms employed were more than a hundred times more effective than in the other. But even the most imperfect flour mill is by far a more economical system of comminuting corn than the jaws of animals; and if every man were obliged, as the horse is, to grind his corn by means of his teeth alone, he would find his powers for the performance of other kinds of labor considerably lessened.

It has been urged as an objection to the use of bruised oats by horses, that they exercise in that state a laxative influence upon the animal's bowels. I doubt very much that such is frequently the case, when the animal is fed only upon oats and hay and straw; but even if the oats produce such an effect, the addition of a small proportion of beans--the binding properties of which are well known--will obviate the disadvantage.

The desirability of mechanically acting upon soft food is not so apparent as the necessity for the bruising of oats is. Roots are so easily masticable that if they are rendered more so there is danger of their being so hastily swallowed as to escape thorough insalivation, which is so necessary to ensure perfect digestion. To guard against this danger, perhaps the best way would be to give pulped mangels and turnips mixed with cut straw; a mixture which could not easily be bolted.

Mr. Charles Lawrence, of Cirencester, who is a great advocate for the cooking of food, and has frequently published his experience of the benefits derivable therefrom, thus describes his method of combining pulped roots with dry fodder:--

We find that, taking a score of bullocks together fattening, they consume per head per diem three bushels of chaff, mixed with just half a cwt. of pulped roots, exclusive of cakes of corn; that is to say, rather more than two bushels of chaff are mixed with the roots, and given at two feeds, morning and evening, and the remainder is given with the cake, &c., at the middle-day feed, thus:--We use the steaming apparatus of Stanley, of Peterborough, consisting of a boiler in the centre, in which the steam is generated, and which is connected by a pipe on the left hand with a large galvanised iron receptacle for steaming food for pigs, and on the right with a large wooden tub, lined with copper, in which the cake, mixed with water, is made into a thick soup. Adjoining this is a slate tank, of sufficient size to contain one feed for the entire lot of bullocks feeding. Into this tank is laid chaff with a three-grained fork, and pressed down firmly; and this process is repeated until the slate tank is full, when it is covered down for an hour or two before feeding time. The soup is then found entirely absorbed by the chaff, which has become softened and prepared for ready digestion.

Mr. Wright, near Dunbar, gives the following account of an experiment with pulped roots and straw and oil-cake. It appears to prove the superiority of mixed foods over the same foods consumed separately:--

Two lots of year-old cattle were fed; the one in the usual way--sliced turnips and straw, _ad libitum_--the others with the minced turnips, mixed with cut straw. The first lot consumed daily 84 lbs. sliced turnips, 1 lb. oil-cake, 1 lb. rape-cake, 1/2 lb. bean-meal, broken small and mixed with a little salt, and what straw they liked. The second lot ate, each, daily, 50 lbs. minced turnips, 1 lb. oil-cake, 1 lb. rape-cake, 1/2 lb.

bean-meal, and a little salt, the whole being mixed with double the bulk of cut straw or wheat chaff. In spring, the lot of cattle which had the mixed food were in good condition, and equally well grown as others, though they had consumed in five months two tons less of roots apiece. The reporter does not advise the mincing process to be commenced when cattle are very forward in condition, as any change of food requires a certain time to accustom the animals to it, and in the meantime fat cattle are apt to fall off in condition. It ought to be begun when they are young and lean.

Mr. Duckham, of Baysham Court, Ross, Herefordshire, says:--

The advantages of pulping roots for cattle are--1st, Economy of food; for the roots being pulped and mixed with the chaff, either from threshing or cut hay or straw, the whole is consumed without waste, the animals not being able to separate the chaff from the pulped roots, as is the case when the roots are merely sliced by the common cutter, neither do they waste the fodder as when given without being cut.

2. The use of ordinary hay or straw. After being mixed with the pulp for about twelve hours, fermentation commences, and this soon renders the most mouldy hay palatable, and animals eat with avidity that which they would otherwise reject. This fermentation softens the straw, makes it more palatable, and puts it in a state to a.s.similate more readily with the other food. In this respect I think the pulper of great value, particularly upon corn farms where large crops of straw are grown, and where there is a limited acreage of pasture, as by its use the pastures may be grazed, the expensive process of haymaking reduced, and, consequently, an increased number of cattle kept. I keep one-third more, giving the young stock a small quant.i.ty of oil-cake, which I mix with the chaff, &c.

3. Choking is utterly impossible, and I have only had one case of hoove in three years, and that occurred when the mixture had not fermented.

4. There is an advantage in mixing the meal with the chaff and pulped roots for fattening animals, as thereby they cannot separate it, and the moisture from the fermentation softens the meal and ensures its thorough digestion, whereas, when given in a dry state without any mixture, frequently a great portion pa.s.ses away in the manure.

On the value of the process for a grazing farm with but a small quant.i.ty 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 quant.i.ty of hay and straw and mix with a sufficient quant.i.ty 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 gra.s.s, and kept through the summer for Christmas, 1860--I cut nearly all straw, with a very small quant.i.ty 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.