The ration fed is higher than a balanced ration. There has never been any sickness resulting from the use of silage. The animals always come through the winter in good breeding condition and in proper shape to be turned on to pasture in the spring.
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.
Secret of Feeding Molasses.
The feeding of black strap molasses came into vogue when the United States artillery and cavalry horses in Porto Rico required “plumping up.” By free use of this readily assimilated fattening food mixed with cut hay or grass, horses that had run down to skin and bone and become covered with harness sores quickly gained flesh and acquired sleek, polished, sound hides so that their former drivers or riders failed to recognize them. Although large quantities of molasses were fed to each horse daily, neither colic nor scouring was caused.
Dr. W. H. Dalrymple, veterinarian of the Louisiana Experiment Station, says that the amount of molasses fed to the large sugar-mules of 42 plantations in his state is from 8 to 12 pounds per head per diem, or an average of about 9.5 pounds; a gallon of black strap molasses weighing 12 pounds. He advises that less than this should be given at first and gradually increased as the animals get used to it, though he adds: “We have not experienced any ill effects from feeding the amounts alluded to.” In fact, as high as 21 pounds per day has been fed in Louisiana without any untoward results. The molasses is mixed with concentrates and cut hay.
Here is a recommended formula for molasses feeding on a lesser scale to working draft horses:
Molasses, 1 quart; water, 3 quarts; cut hay, 5 pounds; corn-meal, 4 quarts; coarse bran, 2 pints. Feed morning and night. Give usual quantity of oats at noon, and add long hay at night.
The Department of Agriculture, in Farmer’s Bulletin No. 107, states that molasses is an excellent food for horses and cattle. It produces energy, maintains the vital heat, stimulates the appetite and increases the digestibility of the other constituents of the ration. That cane molasses is a satisfactory substitute for starchy foods, being readily digested and transformed into work: that 5 quarts of molasses can be given daily to a 1,270 pound horse with advantage to its health and the efficiency of its work.