SHELTER SAVES FOOD.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2444, 4 February 1882, Page 3

SHELTER SAVES FOOD.

Every keeper of animals would actually profit by a little study of chemistry and physiology. Here is a short lesson —All kinds of food, as hay, grain, bread, meat, &c., are. like wood, mainly composed of charcoal (carbon) and water, with considerable nitrogen in some of thorn. To prove this, strongly heat any of the above food materials in a coal pit, or better, under glass. Water, with some nitrogen gas, will bo driven off and can be found in the glass receiver, while only charcoal will remain. Let in more air and the charcoal itself will unite with the oxygen of the atmosphere, and also go off as a transparent, invisible carbonic acid gas. This chemical action sets at liberty heat that was before concealed or insensible, the same as when wood or coal is burned rapidly in a stove, producing an active fire; or as when wood decays, but’gives off heat so slowly as not to be observed. Exactly the same thing occurs when any food is dissolved (digested) in the stomach of animals or men, and is taken into the blood and carried to all parts of the body. The blood gets oxygen also from the air in the lungs, and carries it all through the body. The atoms of oxygen meet the atoms of digested food, here, there, and everywhere in the blood vessels. The two unite just as they do in a stove ; heat is produced, only a minute quantity at any one point, but a great deal of it, taking the whole blood circulation together, and so the whale body is kept warm, though heat is constantly escaping from the whole outside surface. Nature provides that the body shall always be kept warm, otherwise it would quickly perish j and so if the oxygen in the blood don’t find food enough to keep the internal heat, it will attack and consume any fat or flesh stored in the body, and thus make the animal poor. We must have on ever-burning fire in both the animal and human system. If the surrounding atmosphere is cold, and oarries off heat rapidly from the surface of the body, we must increase the internal production of heat by putting in more food, or by surrounding the body with a covering that will prevent the escape of much heat. Is it not plain then that hy keeping animals warm, by means of close buildings, or shelter against heat-stealing winds, less food will be needed, and there will be less waste of flesh in making heat ? Any arrangement of shelter, cover, stable, shed, blankets —anything that will prevent the natural warmth from passing away from the surface of any animal—will be a great saving of food required to keep up the absolutely necessary internal life warmth ; will prevent loss of flesh; will allow the food to go more to adding ;to weight of flesh, or the yield of milk,|or of wool. Shelter and external warmth in cold weather are most economical and therefore profitable in the keeping of farm stock.