Stock and stalks

Chemical Analysis. The chemical analysis of feed does not by any means tell the whole story. Wheat straw, for instance shows up very well in chemical analysis but experiments have shown that it takes more energy to digest it than it produces. Even when we figure only the digestible nutrients, the nutrients which by chemical analysis are found to be digested by animals, we do not by any means have the whole story. For instance, in human food we find that the protein in milk is about four times as valuable as the protein in the bean. In the results of a feeding experiment reported in Dr. McCollum’s “Newer Knowledge of Nutrition” on page 75, it was found that when the source of protein was the bean, four times as much was required for maintaining the body weight of the animal as when the source of protein was milk. We used to figure protein as protein and carbohydrates as carbohydrates but now we discriminate. We must learn to figure them in the results they produce. This is extremely difficult to do scientifically. When an animal must have a variety of feeds who can tell just what proportion of her production is due to certain foods eaten?

We can get at these things in a general way, however, by experience. Feeding has long been known as an art. Some day it may be entirely a science. But that can not be said at the present time. We must vary the feeds used and learn by experience and observation what gets the best results. A chemical analysis of tender grass will not show it to contain more digestive nutrients than the old tough grass that the cows will hardly eat, but it requires much less energy to convert it into milk.

One year I listed some squaw corn about the tenth of July in a wheat stubble. By frost this corn was beginning to come into roasting ears. But most of the ears had not developed kernels. I filled the silo from this field and got, as nearly as I could ascertain, just as much milk from my herd by feeding that silage as by feeding silage made from mature corn containing considerable grain. The same amount of dry grains were fed in both cases. According to analysis this result could not possibly be obtained.

Experiments have been tried in which the whole wheat plant, grain, straw and all, also the oat plant and the corn plant were fed separately to young heifers. The heifers fed the corn plant grew to maturity and bore young normally. The heifers fed wheat and oats did poorly, produced their young prematurely, all but one of which died soon after birth. This does not indicate that oat or wheat feeds are not good for cattle, but in themselves they are not sufficient. I do not think this deficiency can be shown in the chemical analysis but some of the food elements are hard to get. I think if this wheat and oat plant had been young and tender as a growing grass instead of a mature grain the heifers would have done well. Ground oats is one of the best dairy feeds I ever tried.

Balanced Rations. I do not know just to what extent a cow requires a balanced ration. Since some feeds have values over others that the chemical analysis does not show, I think the balanced ration figures and tables have been overworked. They are not entirely valueless, however. Some will be placed in this book. Everyone knows that a cow should not be fed one kind of feed only. We should give as great a variety of feeds as possible and the cow’s likes and dislikes, together with the results in the milk pail, give about all the information concerning a balanced feed that the writer has ever used. We do not need to worry about the supply of protein here because we use so much alfalfa, or about the carbohydrates when we are feeding the product of the corn plant.

A variation from a balanced ration does not immediately affect the cow and usually one change offsets another. Experienced feeders of record-making cattle make use of the chemical analysis of feeds in their intense effort to have the cow digest a very large amount of food, yield a large amount of milk, and still keep her bodily weight about normal. But for farm conditions we should know that too great an amount of alfalfa, bran, and like feeds usually results in sleek, fat cattle and that cows fed principally corn and carbohydrates, if they are milking well, will look rather rough and get too thin. The writer at one time had alfalfa in such abundance that he let the milk herd run out in the field and eat all they wanted from the stack. They had silage and other feeds about as usual, but they did not eat as much silage as they should have. The result was that the herd looked fine and thrifty but produced less milk.

Many people think that a cow is either lean or fat and if she fills out in her body she is always taking on fat, but the amount of lean meat on the body also varies. Protein feeds are muscle builders. They make animals grow. Carbohydrates supply fat and energy which is a separate thing from muscle. Many times if cows become overweight we reduce the total amount of feed consumed and get a large yield in the milk pail. “The eye of the feeder fattens his cattle.” It also fills the milk pail. Scientific knowledge can help a good feeder but I doubt very much if it alone can make one. Rules and system can not be made to take the place of interest and attention.

For those who care to go thoroughly into the subject of feeding I recommend “How to Feed the Dairy Cow,” by Hugh Van Pelt, Editor of Kimball’s Dairy Farmer, Waterloo, Iowa.

I have referred those who wish to go deeply into the subject of feeds to more eminent authorities because I have never raced cows in a record contest and am not an authority on the subject. The reason I have for writing is that I have viewed the subject from the standpoint of profit making rather than that of high production. Feeding for profit has been too little considered.

Pastures. The way that pastures are generally used is, in my opinion, the greatest mistake in the milk business. Certainly we can make two blades of grass grow where one blade of grass and one weed grew before. Most of the pastures that we see are either bare like a desert or weedy enough to hide a calf three months old. A cow can not get enough feed in the average pasture, no matter how many acres she mows over. There is no need to estimate how many acres of poor pasture a cow requires, but one acre of well-cared for pasture per cow is all the writer has ever had to use. While I have fed a small amount of alfalfa in the summer, I think it is safe to say that our cows had more grass per head than almost any cows in the county. Next year I expect to pasture fifty cows on thirty acres, feeding what is necessary in addition. I expect to get nearly enough grass in a reasonably good year for that number of cows.

The secret of the system lies in the fact that I have the pasture divided into four parts and pasture one part at a time, then use a mowing machine to clip off all weeds or remaining grass close to the ground. Before turning the cattle into one of these pastures, I wait until the grass has had about four weeks to grow. If the grass gives out, the cow is given enough feed to make up the difference. I do not let the grass stay short, for if it stays short, the roots will also be short and in that condition it can not withstand drought. Any kind of grass will yield two or three times as much feed per acre, if allowed to grow a month at a time as it will if pastured off short all of the time. I let the cattle eat the grass off the pasture about as often as alfalfa is cut. Everyone knows that if they would cut their alfalfa every three days they would have hardly a hat full of hay at the end of the season. I aim to mow the pasture about the time that the cattle are taken out, for I do not want any old, tough grass for the next time that the cattle are turned into it.

Much of our pasture is a mixture of blue grass, timothy and sweet clover with the sweet clover predominating. I do not want to place too much reliance on shallow rooting grasses, such as white clover and blue grass, although I have some pasture of that kind. I like to have about five acres of sorghum or Sudan grass to pasture once about the first of August and then again about the second week in September.

Sweet clover will root about four feet deep. Alfalfa will root much deeper but is not practical as a pasture. Blue grass and white clover, especially where cropped off short, root very shallow. Sudan grass will draw moisture three or four feet deep. Sudan grass is like sorghum and may at some time turn poison late in the fall, as far as I know, but I know people who use it regularly for pasture and have never had any such trouble. I have never pastured Sudan grass but have used sorghum, and have had no bad results. To get the most out of pasture we must have all the surface available for use and we must give the plant an opportunity to breathe in order that it may root as deep as possible, and then we should use deep rooting grasses such as sweet clover and Sudan grass or sorghum.

In getting at the value of pastures be sure to remember that the cow goes out to harvest the crop. I do not think that pasture is an expensive feed. It is probably the cheapest feed we can get all things considered, when properly managed.

Hay. Four tons of alfalfa hay contain more nutrients than ten tons of silage, and hay is cheaper to raise and cheaper to harvest. The intensive dairy farmer makes alfalfa hay form as large a part of his ration as practical, for a certain variety is needed. However, figuring alfalfa as against corn fodder, the fodder is the cheaper under average conditions. The by-product farmer will do well to use as little alfalfa as he can and still get good results.

The principal value in alfalfa hay for cattle feeding is in the leaves and the results obtained are so dependent upon the kind of hay we get that we consider that part of the secret of feeding lies in putting up the hay. It has been demonstrated by Headdon of the Colorado Experiment Station that where alfalfa is put up by the most careful method, three hundred and fifty pounds of leaves are lost for every ton of hay put up. Where alfalfa is carelessly handled and most of the leaves fall off, we lose as much as three thousand pounds of leaves for every ton of hay put up, and the hay that remains is of very little value so far as milk cows are concerned. Not only do we lose the leaves of alfalfa but we can lose the food value out of the leaf very easily. The alfalfa leaf is very easily digested and the nutrients so easily digested are leached out by rain. They even leave the plant when it is bleached in the sun. The stem of the alfalfa has some value, however, if it is cut young enough to be tender. Old, woody stems will show well in a chemical test but will show poorly in a profit test on a dairy farm.

We can judge the feeding value of alfalfa by its color. Well-cured hay should be pea-green, without must and not dusty. We get more alfalfa by raking it soon after it is mowed, and by curing it in windrows or in shocks, than if we let it remain spread out to bleach in the sun. Besides curing hay in the shock, I have seen another method used and good results obtained where the barn was very large in proportion to the amount of hay put in it. Hay was hauled in from the field very green and dumped by slings along the center of the barn without being tramped. After several days it is spread. The heated hay, when lifted up in the air and piled up loose, cools off rapidly, the heat helping greatly to dry off the moisture. Such hay will not heat again and it retains its color.

I do not think there is any other grass so valuable for hay as is alfalfa. Before we had alfalfa we used cane and millet. Sweet clover is favored by some. It is about the same as alfalfa chemically, and I do not doubt that it makes a good hay if not allowed to get woody. I have never used sweet clover as hay. Sudan grass is a sorghum and has come into some favor. It has about the same food value, however, as the corn stalk which the farmer already has available.

Corn Fodder. There are thousands of acres of corn stalks being pastured in Nebraska and Iowa that have not much more value as they stand in the field than the dead grass by the roadside. Saved and utilized they are the great source of wealth that as yet is almost untouched. Their yield is like a low-grade ore found in abundance. Dry fodder containing no grain is worth at least half as much per ton as alfalfa and the yield is approximately two tons per acre. I say it is worth half as much but I have to guess at it. It contains just as many pounds of digestible nutrients per ton as alfalfa and more than prairie hay. How much it is worth depends largely upon the conditions under which it is fed. It costs no more to cut and shock fodder than to husk a field of corn. Cutting up the fodder and husking out the ears by machine is not an expensive operation. Remember that hay must be brought in from the field. The entire cost of cut fodder for feeding can fairly be figured as about the cost of operating the machine that does the cutting and husking. It is the cheapest feed that we can get.

Many years ago there were several large corn shredding machines sold throughout this territory. They husked the corn and shredded the fodder but they did not prove a success because fodder, unless unusually dry, gets musty if cut up fine with an ensilage cutter and piled up. The new and really successful way of handling fodder is with a small machine that runs with a small gasoline engine. A supply of fodder should be cut up every ten days or two weeks until a time comes when the fodder is real dry—not earlier than December. Then the job may be finished and the feed will last indefinitely.

Silage Without Corn. Some feeders put this cut-up fodder in a silo as soon as the corn is dry enough to keep in the crib. They run water in with it and all reports seem to agree that it makes a good silage. I have not tried this, but I hope the scheme has in it the final solution of the problem. Silo agents have been in the habit of arguing that you can afford to feed silage, corn and all, to all of the stock on the place and let the corn stalks that are not put into the silo go to waste. I do not agree with them. Instead of putting fifteen acres of corn in the silo where much of it is to be fed to young stock and horses, use twenty or even twenty-five acres of stalks alone and you will get just about as good results. But think of the saving. The corn stalks are a by-product. You had to farm so many acres to get them. A part of your business is raising corn and the stalks are paid for by the grain.

Suppose then you feed grain grown on five acres of land. You are using just one-third of the acres to feed your cattle that would be used if you had put in fifteen acres of corn and fed it, corn and all. This shows the advantages of the by-product producer. It fills in the big gap that has been forgotten. It is figuring on a cost basis rather than that of yield or speed in production.

Last winter a feeding experiment was tried at the Wisconsin Experiment Station in which corn silage with grain in was tested against silage from which the corn had been picked. The result showed that the cows ate slightly more silage when it contained the grain and yielded on an average three pounds more milk. The cost of the milk produced with and without the grain in the silage was exactly the same. Silage was figured at $6.50 per ton, corn and all, and without grain at $4.00. Since the average farmer has cornstalks to waste and only has to figure the cost of saving them, they should not be figured at nearly two thirds of the corn crop, even after they have been made into silage.

However, it usually pays to feed grain to cows that are milking. The main saving in the use of husked fodder lies in getting cheaper feed for growing young stock and feeding dry cows.

I recommend a system of feeding silage, corn and all, to producing cows only. If you do not have cows enough to prepare to feed them separately, it will pay better to use no silos that have grain in them at all. Feed the grain to those cows only that are giving milk and will pay for it, or the cattle that you are fattening. Hold the rest of the grain for high prices. It will pay better.

Silage. The important thing about a silo is to make it tall enough and small enough around. The following dimensions are approximately correct:

For 12 to 15 cows, silo should be 10 feet in diameter
For 20 to 30 cows, silo should be 12 feet in diameter
For 30 to 40 cows, silo should be 14 feet in diameter
For 40 to 60 cows, silo should be 16 feet in diameter

Silage will spoil on top unless at least two inches are fed off each day. It usually pays to have several small silos rather than one big one because during the summer months you may want to feed only a part of a ration. The figures given are for full rations. Have the silo air tight. Cut the corn fine and put lots of effort on tamping it. The “Flink’s Perfect Silo Seal” is a canvas that is treated with some kind of tar preparation. It spreads out over the top of the silo and is filled more than a foot deep with water. This weighs down the silage and makes a good air tight cover. Very little silage decays under it. With such a cover you can feed periodically and still lose hardly a day’s feeding of silage.

Grain Feed. Grain should be fed mixed with other feeds. I have often been told how foolish was the old idea of the cow losing her cud. But a cow can hardly re-gurgitate and re-chew grain by itself, and all food eaten by a cow should be re-chewed. If food passes into the intestines without being chewed a second time, it is likely to sour and cause scouring and loss of appetite or even death, when a large amount of grain has been consumed. We usually feed grains with silage or fine-cut alfalfa. Alfalfa run through an ensilage cutter without any re-cutting attachment, is said to make cows’ mouths sore, but I would much prefer to feed it that way and risk sore mouths than to risk the grain by itself. Some farmers feed corn and cob-meal. The cob is of no value except to lighten the ration, but if there is nothing else to dilute the grain with, by all means use the cob. Oats, corn, hominy feed, which is a by-product in the manufacturing of corn meal, bran, which is not very valuable where plenty of alfalfa is fed, and oil meal form our principal feeds for dairy cows. Some get very good results by feeding ground speltz and barley, others by feeding ground rye. Corn, oats, wheat feeds and oil meal will generally form the main part of our ration. The average farmer is hardly warranted in looking farther for grains to feed. Oil meal helps as a conditioner and is fed in small amounts only. Cottonseed meal may be of value but has never proven so in the writer’s personal experience.

Grain should be ground so that all of the nutriments may be absorbed. The amount of grain to be fed varies with the amount of milk that the cow is producing. One pound of grain to every five pounds of milk is a fairly good rule to follow. If more grain is fed there should be another reason for it, and that is that the cow readily responds to more feeding and makes sufficient profit to pay for the extra grain. The old rule, in the main, is true that it takes a certain amount to maintain bodily weight of the animal, and that the more feed above the maintenance ration that she can consume and turn into milk, the more the profit. But even that rule should not be taken too literally. If the extra feed is all grain, it may be too expensive.

Prepared Feeds. There are many kinds of prepared feeds on the market and I have no right either to knock or to boost them, because I know practically nothing about them. Where there are combination feeds, intended to make a balanced ration, I think the farmer would very likely be paying a good deal for the combining. Where a mill man buys grain from farmers and from those grains prepares feeds that are not by-products of other milling operations, I think the price would be high. I have known farmers to sell alfalfa hay and buy alfalfa meal, but I do not think it pays to do those things. All I would say concerning prepared feeds would be to experiment carefully and to buy them, not on their guaranteed chemical analysis, but on what results they actually show in the milk pail. Some prepared feeds contain oat hulls which are about like wheat straw to digest. Dried sugar beet pulp is a by-product feed containing mostly carbohydrates, and seems to have some benefit as an appetizer. Cattle like it for a change. Where it is not too high and carbohydrate rough feeds are to be purchased, it might be profitable to try it.