Feeding Standards for Dairy Cows

The introduction of feeding standards for cattle coincides with the introduction of stall feeding conditions. Under pastoral conditions, cattle were fed in the meadows during the spring and summer months, and after a short time on the stubbles were wintered on straw and hay. During the latter half of the eighteenth century the practice of feeding cattle in stalls during the spring and summer months had developed, and with this development there gradually grew up a demand for a more exact knowledge on the rational feeding of farm animals. The use of roots for summer feeding, and the more extensive use during the winter months of rape cake and cereal grains as supplements to straw and hay led to a desire for knowledge. The farmer particularly wished to obtain a better knowledge of the replacement values of such feeding stuffs as were at that time at his disposal, and the scientists endeavoured to satisfy that demand. Regarded historically, the expression of the nutritive requirements of feeding stuffs for cattle developed in four distinct stages. In the first, the mutual replacement values of foods were assessed by chemical considerations and expressed in terms of “hay.” This constituted the “hay value system,” with which Thaer, Boussingault, and Emil von Wolff are associated.