Food for Dairy Cows.

Otago Witness, Issue 1912, 13 July 1888, Page 7

Food for Dairy Cows.

Hay and oats, admirable as they are, according to Professor Long, rank among the dearest of any stock foods, and the farmer can try other materials which will do the same work for a great deal less money, and it is to his advantage to do so if he has a knowledge of the properties of food and can mix them for himself. Linseed, for example, contains the fab which is so necessary, and in the cheapest form. Roughly speaking, 31b costs 3d, and provides lib of oil— really more than enough for a large cow— but it also contains some of the lean and the bread-like foods.

Maize, which is one of the cheapest foods known if hought when cheap, is largely used in its ground state, when it is called Indian meal, ib contains the bread of the ration, with small quantities of the fat and tbo lean in addition; while cotton-cake contains large proportions of the lean or albuminous food, and is the cheapest) food of this kind which can be obtained. It also contains, or should coutain pure, a large percentage of oil or fat, so that a 10 per cent, cake would provide a beast with Mb of oil for every 51b consumed. Beans and" pease aro also extremely valuable foods of the same nature, being extra rich iv lean, which makes the lean of meat and the curd of milk ; but both fonds are very deficient in oil.

Linseed cake is not so valuable as linseed, price for price, especially when the quality of the cake is unkuown. We know what we get with the pure linseed, but in the cake, as everyone knows who has experience, all kinds of seeds are mixed, while the oil is so pressed that very little is allowed to. remain. Cotton cake ia cheaper than linseed, and contains tuorc nourishment ; but it is more, binding, and is more valuable for use with roots, grass, ensilage, and India.n meal, If we mix two dry foods, we might take Indian meal and pea meal or cotton cake, or rice meal and bean meal. Lingeed cake ia uot so well adapted for use with rice meal or Indian meal, because it is of similar nature, nor is it so good for uae with turnips or mangels, unless for actual fattening purposes. Now, cotton Cdke and maize aro cheap foods when well bought, much cheaper than either oats, linseed cake, or hay, aud they go further. The cotton-cake has the inestimable advantage of being nearly as valuable after passing through the cattle as before consumption, so much is the manure enriched. We might, then, almost make our ration for milking cows Mb linseed steamed in water, 31b decorticated cotton-cake, and 31b Indian meal, irrespective of the roots they will «se. If no hay, but plenty of roots and straw, then 41b to 51b of the cake would be necessary. Bran is a valuable food, of similar nature to cotton-cake, except that it is not so binding ; bnt it "tt, nevertheless, well adapted for use with Indian meal, which is a capital winter iood, being very heating. We have stated, that hay is the dearest of all foods. This is because it is necessary to consume so muoh of it, in order to extracteuffioient nourishment to maintain a lanm animal and to provide her with the means of manufaobnring milk.— Mark Lane Express.

Relative Value of Artificial Manures. An interesting lecture, on this subject was de« hvered by Dr AitkeD, chemist to the Highland and Agricultural Society, at Castle Douglas recently, under the auspices of the local farraera' club. The chairman, in introducing Dr Aitken, said that the farmers* club had done a power of good in securing welUprepared and pure manures.

Di Aitken prooeeded to give the result of the experiments, whfch had extended over a period of eight years. The object of the experiments was to find out the gpecifie or special action o£ various manures which wore in the market and* used by farmers* and if they had special action , which required that they should be used i» cer- ' tarn ways, why owe manure was better fijbteoftbaa another. Experiments were' carried, oh witkphosphates-, nitrogenous manures,, and' potash mfrmwea. 'Sneaking of; phxiephafces, hejsaid &•. w<w supposed to'makQ a great differe&e % tfe "

manure whether it was animal or mineral manure. Another difficulty was whether there was any relative advantage in soluble or insoluble phosphate. They took mineral phosphates of various kinds that where in the market and got them finely ground, and they found there was a very great advantage in using perfectly undisflolved but

FINELY-GROUND MINERAL PHOSPHATE; but on comparing the results arrived at by the use of the undissolved and unground phosphates they found there was a decided advantage in using the dissolved phosphate— that is to say, the superphosphate. It was found there was sometimes a saving to the extent of 10 per cent., sometimes actually 25 per cent., and on one occasion it was 50. It was not so much a question of what kind of phosphate was used, but how finely it was ground ; it matter not what phosphate was in the market, the one that was most finely ground produced the best results — it should be ground to a fineness so that it would go through a wire gauze which contained 100 wires to the inch at least, though he had had manures which went through a gauze of 150 wires to the lineal inch. This was a thing which every farmer who was going to use mineral phosphates should have in his possession. He could simply put his phosphate upon the little bit of wire gauze turned up at the edges, and sift it and see what proportion the residue bore to the proportion gone through, and he could thus tell the relative fineness of his manure. But they would never get manufacturers to grind so finely as was wanted unless it was demanded, because manufacturers had no interest in grinding manures. It might be asked — Do you recommend the use of these undissolved phosphates at all ? From the experiments he found they didn't fall very far behind the others. There were circumstances in which he would recommend that a finely-ground undissolved phosphate should be used rather than superphosphate, as, for instance, on mossy, moory land, which has a great deal of organic matter in it. But in the majority of cases superphosphate was the most convenient sort of application, for in the first place the phosphates were soluble, and could suck through the ground. If it was dry and floury, it was excellent for making a general distribution of the manure over the ground ; but if it was lumpy, they should not use it. The results of the experiments between soluble and insoluble had been to show that the whole thing just turned on the fineness of the grinding ; if they only got it fine enough there was no necessity discussing whether it was dissolved or undissolved, or whether it was animal or mineral phosphate. As regards superphosphates, if they wanted to top dress a pasture they should prefer superphosphate to soluble phosphate, because it went down to the roots quicker. The same principle applied to bone manure as to phosphates. If they wanted to get the best use of their bones they must just grind them fine enough. Of course there was a difficulty in the case of a windy day ; but they could overcome that by damping the bone meal; of course not so much as to make it lumpy. They were too apt to think too much upoa the immediate crop and not so much of the soil; but bones had the effect of really enriching the land and producing better [crops afterwards. Speaking of

NITROGENOUS MANURES, the doctor said they experimented with soluble and insoluble, some of animal origin and some of vegetable origin ; though origin had nothing to do with it when they came to a conclusion. They thought dried blood was a very excellent and quick manure because it rotted very quick, and unless a manure rotted very quick it did not feed the plant. The value of all these nitrogenous manures was just iv accordance as they were easily rotted. They also found that some things which he used to thiDk were no manure at all really had a considerable amount of manurial value if they were only ground fine enough. Even leather finely ground was a manure, though if they tried clippings it would be utterly useless, and the same applied to horns. He also tried some potash manure of the common kind — the potash of the earth. He took a piece of felspar, which contained a good deal of potash, and ground it to an exceedingly fine powder, and he found last year it was a manure, though he would have said the year before it was perfectly useless for manurial purposes. Nitrate of soda was a very quick acting manure, exceedingly soluble, and ready to be taken up by the plants, and should therefore be used when they wanted it to act immediately. This manure was more suitable for all crops than sulphate of ammonia ; indeed, there were certain crops the latter did harm to. For instance, if it was put on a cereal crop, it took a while before it was completely into the proper form in which roots could suck it up, and before it had done its work the time for absorbing it was over. There was a great loss in putting on nitrate if they had a light soil to work on, and a wet climate, and especially if they had a fallow crop to grow. They would in that case simply be spending money on nitrate when it would do them no good, because it would be carried down into the drains. There was no barm to the crop, but there was harm to the pocket of the farmer. They need not expect to get good crops by nitrate alone ; there must be enough of phosphates and potash. If there were plenty of these they could not do wrong in putting on the nitrate if the soil and crop could hold it. Grass was a thing on which they could put nitrate often ; the roats kept it from going down to the drains.

Sulphate of ammonia was better for a wet climate, and especially if there was a little clay injthe land, because clay had the power of keeping the ammonia ; but they mu9t not use it unless they had enough of phosphates on the land. Nitrate had got a bad name, but if they had land rich in phosphates, no considerations of bad names given to nitrate should come between them and it. What they wanted was a big crop. A big crop paid.

There was a kind of idea in the human mind, apart altogether from farming, that the grass was there for the purpose of feeding stock, and that it should never stop feeding stock. The fact is that

GRASS IS EASILY EXHAUSTED, and the grass on land which had not been manured for a long time must be exhausted if it is much mowed and eaten off. It was bound to be reduced in character, and show all the signs of grass with very little body in the soil below it. Grass like that" required phosphoric manuring In regard to the choice of methods, that was just where farming came in. He could not imagine a calliug that required for every operation a greater exercise of judgment than farming. He would not use soluble manures for that grass. Dung was a most important thing for improving soil of that kind, and all kinds of vegetable rubbish that could be gathered together. Speaking of

MANURING BY KOTATION, he said he did not think the plan a good one of putting all the manure upon turnips and trusting to the following three or four years to pick np the residue ef the manure. If he had a five years' rotation and wanted to manure the land, he would not put it on with a hunger and a burst He would put it on with great judgment. Every year there must he supplied what the crop wants post, - What did turnips want most? If the

first place phosphates. Sulphate of ammonia was., a splendid manure for turnips. The application of potash, when using dung, diminished the crop. Turnip roots had a great power of absorbing potash ; they could get potash where any other plant could scarcely find enough for its purpose. Therefore they had to supply the plant with what it had not got in it in great abundance. They didn't find that turnips contained any great quantity of phosphate ; turnips had great difficulty in getting phosphates during the early part of their life! Therefore supply them liberally with what they had the least power of getting, and a wonderful crop would be the result.

He would use potash for the oat crop, because the straw of cereals was greatly strengthened by potash. Clover wanted potash chiefly, and grass a general manure. Fat the potash on the grass the third year; and so by judiciously giving each crop the manure which it most needed, instead of putting it all on indiscriminately at the beginning, they would make it go farther, because when it was all put on at the beginning ifc partly went into the drains. He presumed the kind of manure most used here waß bone manure, but he would not put it on all at once ; he would keep some of the superphosphate back for refreshing the grass afterwards.

LIME, again, was a complicated thing. It was a narcotine substance, because it was able to absorb acids. It was called caustic lime because it burned. When lime was put upon clover and did good, it was not because the clover had to thank you for the lime, but because the lime had united with the acids in the soil which were in company with the potash, axd the application of lime had had the effect of enriching the land. Lime was very useful for its caustic purposes. If the land was in a very bad state they could put on a good dose ; but if it is a sharp land then they must not depend upon burning it with lime. A small application of lime is all that is necessary — half a ton to the acre perhaps. They might put 10 tons to an acre- on clay land and it might do good ; but two or three tons to an acre' on thin land would do a great deal of harm. A little lime added now and then was far better than those great big doses which were very common. They could not get bones out of the land if they did not put the bones in — they all wanted to get something for nothing, but they could not. Aud if they did not teed their land they could not feed their ftock off it.

Dr Aitken then detailed the result of an analysis regarding the amount of loss a farm sustained per cow per annum, and he said the result of that analysis showed that 21b of sulphate of potash and s|lbs of bone meal per cow were required to make up what every cow through its milk took out of a farm in a year. The doctor said he had a good deal of experience in slag, having been supplied with a ton by the people who make it for experimental purposes, It was an excellent manure, but its excellence depended on its being finely ground, and the people who made it would spoil the manure if they didn't take precious good care to have it this way. The lecturer said manure should always be covered ; to leave manure uncovered was a wasteful extravagance.