RATIONS FOR DAIRY COWS.

Bulletin No. 149 of the Michigan Station treats of dairy rations from a Michigan standpoint, but there is so much of the result that applies as well to Pennsylvania that our dairymen may learn much from the experiments.

After a condensed account of various experiments to obtain an answer as to what ration the average dairy cow needs, the report states that after numerous experiments carefully made, their cows give the following answer:

"A thousand-pound cow, in the fourth month after calving, while yielding on an average 1.21 pounds of fat daily, requires 23.57 pounds of dry matter, 2.06 pounds of digestible protein, 12.50 pounds of digestible carbohydrates and 0.89 pounds of digestible fat."

In referring to the formation and calculation of rations, the bulletin has the following:

"Every reader of the bulletin, however, who keeps dairy cows should make an inventory of the fodders and grains he has on hand, and of such materials as he can purchase in the market, should set down the market price of the latter and the selling price of the former, and, with the data, should compute several rations, adopting the one giving the greatest efficiency at the least cost. Experience must teach the peculiarities of each feeding stuff. In the dairy literature he will find recorded the results of experiments with nearly, if not quite, every feeding stuff on the list. Of this information, he should avail himself and should modify his adopted ration accordingly. It may be that his cheapest ration is not available because some one component is illy adapted to the production of milk for the purpose he wants it. When fed, the ration may produce too soft butter, or too hard, or it may be that while the calculated amount of dry matter, protein and other constituents, is theoretically correct, the combination is distasteful to the cow or does not keep her bowels in their normal condition. All of these factors must be considered and given due weight in practical dairy feeding. With all the information he can obtain from bulletins or other sources, and with all the experience obtained from feeding good and poor cows through many years, it is, after all, that indefinable something that we call judgment that determines the adaptability of the ration and the production of profit from feeding cows.

"With the materials in our supposed case, the following combinations are suggested:

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE.

Ration 5.

753

"Forty pounds of silage, 10 pounds timothy hay, 5 pounds of pea meal, 4 pounds of gluten meal; this ration gives the results as under:

24.99 pounds.

Dry matter,

Ration 6.

2.29 pounds.

13.47 pounds.

.83 pounds.

$0.164

If 15 pounds of clover hay be substituted in this ration for the 10 pounds of timothy hay and 4 pounds of gluten meal, the results will be

Dry matter,

25.58 pounds.

2.23 pounds.

12.66 pounds.

.523 pounds.
$.135.

Cost,

A ration nearly as efficient and three cents per day cheaper.
Still other combinations, without silage as a basis, are suggested.

Ration 7.

Corn stalks, 8 pounds; clover hay, 10 pounds; corn meal, 4 pounds; wheat bran, 10 pounds, containing

A ration rather high in dry matter, but very cheap and worth trying.

Ration 8.

Or, cornstalks, 10 pounds; clover hay, 8 pounds; corn meal, 4 pounds; wheat bran, 10 pounds, containing

"As far as indicated by the chemical composition of the feeding stuffs and the mathematical calculations based thereon, the rations to be used with feeding stuffs at the prices named will be made up of clover hay, millet hay, silage, roots, cornstalks, corn meal, wheat

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bran and oats and gluten meal. The wheat and timothy hay would be sold, and of the feeding stuffs in the market wheat bran, gluten meal, malt sprouts, linseed meal, or cotton seed meal would be purchased, the choice depending on the amounts of the different coarse fodders on hand.

"If the supply of clover hay was sufficient, bran would be the byproduct to be bought, but if it is necessary to feed up a considerable quantity of cornstalks and millet hay, cotton seed meal, gluten meal or linseed meal in the order named would be chosen because they furnish the needed protein cheaply. Cotton seed meal cannot be fed in larger amounts than two pounds per day per cow, a fact to be remembered in calculating the amount of protein to be derived from it.

But rations cannot be built up on mathematical rules alone. The peculiarities of the different cows, the milk yield, the lapse of the period of lactation must all be considered. The rules and methods here given are but helps to the experienced feeder. They are not to take the place of judgment and experience, but to aid them. Cattle feeding cannot be relegated to the realm of applied mathematics nor can the tyro succeed as a cow feeder by studying chemical formulae and rules of computing rations. Given, however, a thoughtful and experienced feeder, he can, by studying the composition of feeding materials, learn how to combine them to keep up the production of his herd at less cost and by reducing the cost, increase the profit."

POINTERS IN POTATO CULTURE.

Bulletin No. 130, of the Cornell Experiment Station, gives its readers numerous important points in potato culture, from which we condense the following:

In an experiment the plots having uneven numbers were given thirteen cultivations, while those with even numbers received but nine; as a result, it is stated that the average crop from the thirteen cultivations was 337.5 bushels, while than from the plots receiving but nine was 367.5 bushels.

In 1896 a similar experiment gave as results the apparent fact that the plots receiving eleven cultivations yielded at the rate of 335.9 bushels; those having seven cultivations gave a yield of 343.1 bushels, while those receiving but three workings gave but 275.2 bushels, and an acre which had received six cultivations gave a crop of 330.7 bushels.