Abstract
Young rats from mothers on a uniform diet (Sherman's Diet 13, consisting of one-third whole milk powder and two-thirds ground whole wheat plus common salt equal to 2% of the weight of the wheat with meat and lettuce 3 times a week) have been made anemic by exclusive feeding of fluid milk (pasteurized) from time of weaning. At first all the animals were weaned at the age of 4 weeks, but in order to hasten the development of anemia, weaning at 3 weeks is now being done and 2 of the animals reported in this paper were so weaned.
Hemoglobin determinations have been made at intervals of approximately one week except immediately after weaning, when an interval of about 2 weeks was allowed to give time for the anemia to develop. The Newcomer method with the Newcomer disk, 1 having an accuracy of 5%, has been used, all determinations being done by 2 independent workers taking samples at the same bleeding. These readings have all agreed within the limits of experimental error. All colorimetric readings have also been checked by both observers.
When repeated hemoglobin determinations showed that the percentage in the blood had fallen to approximately half the amount normal for the age, as determined by Williamson and Ets, 2 one-half of the animals were continued on the milk diet as controls while the others were fed daily 6 gm. of whole wheat containing 0.2 mgm. of iron as determined by the Zimmermann-Reinhardt method 3 by 2 independent analysts. The animals ate the wheat well and were also supplied with fluid milk ad libitum.
The control rats, fed milk exclusively, have shown progressive lowering of the blood hemoglobin, in 11 weeks falling to Values between 5.8 and 4.5 gm. per 100 cc. of blood.
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