1882.] ENSILAGE. Ill 



state seems to be the natural condition for ruminants to receive 

 their food in, it would be very desirable to furnish it to them in 

 that state the year round, but where six months of the year are 

 winter, this is difficult. To supply this defect it has been the cus- 

 tom to dry the green food for the frosty season. Though the 

 process of drying does not necessarily destroy or change the food 

 elements of herbage, it has the effect of changing the action of the 

 stomach upon them. Souring in the rumen does not go on as 

 readily with dry food as with green. The same preparation for 

 digestion is not made. The fiber, in particular, will hardly get 

 soaked through before it is time for it to go out of the organ in 

 which it was deposited. This impedes digestion and renders it im- 

 perfect. Aside from completeness of digestion, a cow can accom- 

 plish less on dry than on green food, because she can digest so 

 much more of the latter in a given time. This fact is an argu- 

 ment in favor of ensilage, which, being green, digests so much 

 more rapidly that more of it above the food for support can be 

 utilized in the shape of milk. Ensilage, when skillfully preserved, 

 varies less from the natural condition of food for the cow than 

 when preserved by drying. 



Green food in a tight silo and in the stomach of a cow is closely 

 analogous in respect to condition and changes. The paunch of a 

 ruminant is a silo in miniature, or, if you please, a well-built silo 

 is a huge rumen for the reception and preparation of food for di- 

 gestion. In each the food is partially comminuted, and in each 

 exactly the same action is begun, namely, lactic fermentation. It 

 may be carried a little further in the silo, if it remains long, but 

 as far as they go the character of the changes in both is alike. 

 The great disturbing element in ensilage is not the simple 

 development of the lactic acid. It is the development of al- 

 cohol and vinegar, which only goes on when air is admitted 

 to the silo. Their formation is accompanied with alteration 

 and destruction. In some of the early earth pits more than 

 half the original value of the food was lost by the penetration of 

 air through walls of loose earth. So long as air is kept from the 

 ensilage, alcohol and vinegar can no more form in it than in the 

 stomach of a cow. The lactic fermentation will go on anyhow, 

 closed or open, in the silo as in the stomach, but the change will 

 be confined to the formation of lactic acid, the effect of which 

 upon the food in which it occurs, though supposed to be favor- 

 • able, has never been definitely determined. But, whatever that 



