Secret of Fattening Drafters.
The business of buying young draft horses and feeding them off for the market has been profitably followed by many farmers during the past ten years. The work requires skill and experience and is thus described by Prof. W. J. Kennedy, of the Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station: “In one of the large horse-feeding establishments of the West the following method is practised: The horses are purchased, their teeth are floated and they are all put in the barn and their feed increased gradually, as great care must be taken for a few days to avoid colic. It seems preferable to feed them grain about five times per day, due to the fact that as the stomach of the horse is proportionately smaller than the stomach of a cow, he needs his feed in smaller quantities and more often. The hay is placed in racks so that access may be had to it at all times. The horses are given all the water they will drink twice a day. The daily practise is as follows: Corn is given at 5 o’clock in the morning; water at 7; the hay racks are filled at 9 o’clock, when the horses are also given oats and bran, the proportion being two-thirds bran and one-third oats. At 12 o’clock they are fed corn again; at 3 in the afternoon oats and bran are given and the hay racks are refilled; at 4 they are given a second watering, and at 6 the final feed of corn is given. The proportion for each horse when upon full feed is as follows: Corn from 10 to 14 ears to each feed; oats and bran, about 3 quarts per feed, making in all from 30 to 40 ears of corn and 6 quarts of oats and bran per horse per day. The horses are not given any exercise from the time they are put in the barn until a few days before they are to be shipped. As a substitute for exercise, and in order to keep the blood in good order, thus preventing stocked legs, Glauber’s salt is used.”
In some instances horses fed in this manner have made a gain of 5½ pounds a day for a period of 50 to 100 days. One horse gained 550 pounds in 100 days. In many instances from 12 to 20 horses have made an average daily gain of 3⅓ pounds per day each for a period of 90 days.