20 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



is no farmer among us who makes it a chief reliance, and onl}- uses 

 it as an accompaniment to otlier and better feed. 



Examined by tlie chemist the same conchision is reached. Dr. 

 Atwater, of the Connecticut Experiment Station, examined samples 

 grown on the college farm at Orono, and reported the thin sown as 

 containing 88.1 per cent, water; the thick, 93.6 per cent. A crop 

 of twenty tons — a good j'ield for one acre — would, using the lowest 

 per centage, contain 4.760 lbs. dry matter, and 35.240 lbs. of water. 

 Using the larger per centage would give 2.560 lbs. diy matter, and 

 37.440 lbs. of water. A silo containing 500 tons corn ensilage, 

 giving it the beiiefit of the smaller water content, would contain 

 440.5 tons of water. 



When examined for nutritive elements the estimate put upon it 

 b}- the feeder is corroborated. Aside from the fact that it contains 

 an excessive amount of water, the nutritive elements are not prop- 

 erly balanced. The full explanation of the office of the different 

 elements of nutrition in stock food will not be attempted, and only 

 such allusion made to it as seems necessar3^ It is an important 

 matter, and worth}" of the closest stud}', and will be treated at some 

 length in another part of this report. 



The value of any cattle food is based upon the percentages it 

 contains of albuminoids, carbohydrates and fats. Each of these 

 classes have certain functions to perform by which the animal 

 economy is carried on. One class may be able to do what another 

 cannot. In a perfect food the}^ should maintain a ratio correspond- 

 ing with the demands of the animal. The albuminoids occupy by 

 far the most important place ; and no cattle food will produce satis- 

 factory results when this class of nutritive elements do not come up 

 to the proper ratio with the others. Fodder corn is found to be 

 largely deficient in albuminoids ; which fact, taken in connection 

 with the excess of water, accounts for the unsatisfactor}^ results 

 following all attempts to use it as an exclusive ration. The opera- 

 tion of ensilaging cannot add anything to its nutritive contents, nor 

 can it correct the proi)ortions of its nutritive ingVedients. Therefore 

 the ensilage^ as well as the fodder before this process, needs to have 

 gi-ain, cotton-seed-meal or some other highh' nitrogenous food com- 

 bined with it in order to secure satisfactory- results in feeding 

 it. The enthusiastic advocates of the sj'stem admit this. M. 

 G-offart says: "Sheep and cattle fatten with wonderful rapidity 

 upon maize ensilage; with the addition of eight to ten per cent, in 



