THE RURAL WORLD.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 388, 19 August 1911, Page 6

THE RURAL WORLD.

PTG .MEALS. On few matters in connection with pig-fattening does there appear to bo greater variability in the opinions ot writers than in the question of feeding value of the different kinds of meals used in the manufacture of pork, and of the increase in the feeding value of various meals by intermixture. A recent author, when writing on this subject, stated his views as follows: —That owing to the alleged fact that no investigation in the feeding of young pigs as thrown any light on their requirements, ''we have therefore to fall back upon practice, When the young pigs are capable of taking sufficient amount of food for themselves, they should be accustomed as quickly as possible to the use of such foods, and their protein constituents should be high. In this respect 3uch cereals as maize and barley -have different protein values, and it has been shown that maize alone does not give such a large daily increase of weight as does barley. The same rslative positions are maintained whon the cereals are mixed with separated milk." Wp will leave for a time the question as to whether or not the admixture of separated milk with the maize meal would not to a great extent remedy the defects of the maize as a sole pig-feeding, and proceed to ask the question of either maize or barley can be accepted as a suitable food for young pigs just commencing to eat? Less suitable pig-food could not easily be recommended. It may be asserted that analysis show 3 that barley, and in a lesser degree maize, should furnish young pigs with the constituents required to build up their frames satisfactorily and economically, but the practice and experience prove very clearly that they are most unsui - able. Again, the statement that "It has been shown that maize alone does not give such a large daily increase of weight as does barley" appears to lack solidity of foundation as far as experiments are available to furnish proof. RESULTS OP EXPERIMENTS.

Amongst these experiments one may be taken as a fair sample. Two lots of five pigs of almost exactly equal weight, 20Slb and 2091b, were fed for a period of eight weeks. The one lot consumed 28321b of barley meal, made a total gain of 6101b, thus requiring 4711b of barley meal for each 1001b of increase in live weight. The other lot consumed 31001b of maize meal, which gave a total increase of 7181b live weight, showing that 4351b of maize meal gave as good a return as 4731b of barley meal; so that with pigs weighing about 401b, or some four teen weeks old, the maize meal, instead of being of less feeding value than barley meal, actually produced about one-thirteenth more live weight. In a trial where rather more than an equal weight of separated milk was fed with the maize and the barley meal, the result was somewhat similar, The pigs were nearly twice as old at the commencement of the trial, IP93]b of barley meal and 24041b of separated milk were consumed for a live weight gain of 6041b, whereas 10871b of maize meal and 21921b of separated milk gave an increase of 5911b, so that 1001b gain in the former case was the result of the consumption of 3301b of barley meal and 3981b of milk, whilst in the latter case the 1001b increase in the live weight was obtained from 3001b of maize meal and 371 lb of milk, or a reduction of 241b of meal and 271b of milk, something like 18 percent. In the pamphlet published in Denmark, in which is recorded Fjord's experiments in pigfeeding. much the same results are recorded; but one must in fairness admit that the quality of the pork produced by the use of the barley meal alone would be superior to that manufactured from maize meal alone, yet the cost of the maize meal would be considerably less as a rule. Then, if we pursue the question further, it might bs found that the addition of separated milk to the maize meal would equalise matters so far as concerns the quality of the pork. Should this be the fat then maize meal would prove to be the more economical as a partial food than barley meal. It is acknowledged that some persons persist in pointing out that Lawes' experiments, carried out several years since, conclusively prove that barley meal is the best single food for the manufacture of pork. This is undoubtedly the fact, but, it by no means proves that the admixture of certain meals is not far more profitable than any other sing e meal in the production of pork.

CALF REARING. As the child is said to be the father of the man, so the calf hulds the same relationship to the bullock. fcJtunt the caif during the first six months of its life, and it takes .four years to make an inferior bullock of it; feed it well from the start, and it is fit for the butcher in two years, and is probably worth more in the op::n market than the four year old. These are facts that every graizer knows to be true; and it is time that the matter of calf rearing received greater attention than hitherto from dairymen who make or mar the animal during the first six months of its existence. Many thousands of calves are annually sld by dairymen at.live and six months old at about £1 per head, and such cattle can pay no one; and the grazier who buys the steers seldom gets more than .£6 per week for growing and fattening such animals. This is the age of commercialism, and from this point of view it wuold be better for the country if calvon were either slaughtered at birth and pigs fed on the separated milk, or the calves reared in such a way as to make good cattle of them. At the present price of butterrfat, it would cost, say, 40s to give a calf two gallons of new milk per day for two months. Pay better to kill it. say dairymen; yet such a calf if well bred and given

young grass in addition to the milk, is better worth fjos to the g rah: or than the ordinary separated milk calf is worth at five months old. As an illustration of this, it may be mentioned that the first, priz? two year old steer at last season V- Waikalo spring and autumn shows was, as a placard set forth, fed for '2B days only on new miik, and was then turned away with fattening cattle, and received no special feeding afterwards. A fortnight ago this steer we.s sold by auction at the Hamilton saleyanis j'or 1 ~ guineas. Thus, after allowing i!l for the milk he consumed, the steer paid the grazier Is (id per week for .'57 months, as against the usual (id per week, which the ordinary dairy-fed calf returns. As a further demonstration of the advantages of providing clean young feed for calves, an exhibit at the late Hamilton show which attracted a good deal of attention had before it a card which set forth the following information : —"his heifer, Ruth, was calved on May i)th last, and she is the first calf from a typical da'ry herd. She never sucked. Ruth was fed for seven days on new milk, for five days more she received half new, and for a further 15 days skimmed milk only; but she was tied up where she could get young grass. On June sth Ruth was turned away with a mob of 80 steers on grass and turnips, and she has received neither milcl nor special feeding since. Ruth is here to demonstrate the importance of providing clean young grass pad docks for calves against the common way of herding them in old foul paddocks and feeding for months on separated milk." At the date of the show the heifer was exactly six months old, and she was admittedly much superior to the average dairy fed calf which as all the advantages of the spring weather. The fact appears to have been lost sight of by dairymen, that hygienic principles apply with equal force to young stock and to children.