Litchfield enquirer., 1875-04-01
Experiment Stations for Farmers. WHAT ARE AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STA. TONS! WHAT CAN THEY DO, AND HOW THEIR USE WILL THEY PAye


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 To the Editor 0f the COalrant:-
 The forty thousand farmers in the state use annually some millions of dollars worth of hay, straw. roots, meal, ground feed, etc, for foddering their stock. Many of them believe 1t Is profitable to cook food for cattle, swine and other animals. As many, and perhaps more, say it is bet ter not to cook the food, but to feed out naturally. Tens If not hundreds of thou sands of dollars expense or profit depend upon this question. The isolated and gness work experiments of individual farmers, who have not the requisite time. money. patience and habits of close and careful examination of all details and cir cumstances, cannot settle these questions, Suppose, we have barn with cattle and arrangements for weighing and preparing different kinds of fodder, and with this a chemical laboratory where the food. the milk, the excrement, etc., could be analy- zed; suppose this all be put under the charge of competent, careful, skillful men that they have all needed appliances. and make many accurate, thorough feeding trials, observing everthing. about the con diions of the animals. their increase orde. crease in flesh and fat, the yield of milk. etc. Let them try various kinds of food, and different mixtures of them: let the fodder, the urine and the solid excrement and even the air inhaled and exhaled. be carefully analysed and thus the effect oi the fodder upon the increase of flesh or fas Tn the body or upon the constituents of butter and cheese in the milk be ae- curately learned. Would not large series of such experiments, carried on with the utmost care and nicety, be useful in set ting these questions at rest, and would they not furnish an invaluable guide to practical men, and would not the results of such experiments be worth many times their cost to the people of the state? Nov this would be an experiment. station, and snch would be one of the many knds of expenments there performed.
 We know that different kinds of hay. straw, roots, ground feed, or oil meal are useful for fodder, and every farmer has a general idea which of these are. best for hs special use. Bus no one can tell just waat kinds and mixtures are best or most economlcal for any given purpose. as the ieedlng of young cattle, working oxen. 1astenlng cattle. milch COWS furnishing TOT butter, cheese, or market We want set of experiments to settle these aues- tlms definitely, not only with regard to our neat stock but in the case of horses. sheep and swine. 0 1.--S-N 7
 E1parlnaents in Germany show that much coaase fodder will be digested when properly mixed with more nutritious sub- sfancess and that there is great waste in oar present system of feeding, if that can De called system which &egoverned by no rules. but is merely haphazard way or doing things. Such experiments con dncted here would throw flood of light on tms subject, and by furnishing definite rules for mixing food -rations, would be of vegy great practical value to every owner of live stock, thus adding untold sums to the aggregate profit of farms and to the wealth of the whole state. ssz z9 Ecce =
 Again, crops and plants of all kinds are fed m the soil. Plants are, not alike in