The Van Buren Press

A New Cattle Food
Sunflower cake has been found, especially in Russia, one of the best auxiliary cattle foods. As early as the year 1866, about 100,000 centners of sunflower oil (oil of the seeds of Helianthus annuus) were manufactured in Russia, and its amount has increased year by year, it being esteemed as a very palatable alimentary oil. The oil was formerly obtained by hydraulic means: the residual cake is harder than any other variety of oil cake, and for this reason apparently, it has not found a wider application. Denmark and the northern countries import large quantities annually, as do also the eastern provinces of Germany, and the problem of its disintegration has been successfully solved by several manufacturers there. It is still unknown in southern and western Germany; now, however, that it is put on the market in the form of meal it will doubtless soon find general application, suited, as it is, both on account of its composition and pleasant taste, for fattening cattle. The percentage of protein varies between about thirty to forty-four per cent., the fat between about nine to eighteen per cent. It is possible to prepare two qualities, one rich in protein and poor in fat, and the other rich in fat and poor in protein. When, for example, the somewhat finely-ground meal is sifted, employing a mesh of 1 mm. that which passes through is much richer in protein and poorer in fat than the original, while the reverse is true of that which remains in the sieve.--Farmer's Voice.