704 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
before frost. In the south sweet sorghum has been found to be a good 
silage crop as the tonnage per acre is greater than corn and the heads 
yield a fair percentage of grain. Red clover, alfalfa, and peas have been 
used, but owing to their juiciness it is difficult to get silage from them 
that will not sour. Mixed crops have also been used, out they rarely pay 
for the added trouble of mixing. Plants with hollow stems are unsatis- 
factory it is so difficult to force out the air. 
There are several practicable types of silage cutting machines on the 
market. The blower elevator is used almost altogether now. In filling 
the silo care should be taken to tramp well next to the walls. It is best 
to take several days in filling, so that the air may be forced out more 
completely, tnereby making a sweeter flavored silage. 
Silage is pre-eminently a cow feed. It finds greatest favor with dairy 
cattle since it may be made to reproduce succulence of grass in winter 
or may serve to uphold the milk flow during the drought in summer. In 
dairies near cities where pasture is not available it often determines the 
difference between profit and loss by supplanting costly grain foods. It 
also makes possible the rearing of calves cheaply to replenish the herd. 
Some complaint has been made against the flavor of milk from silage-fed 
cows, but there is no danger from this source, if the silage is first class, 
unless the milk is allowed to remain in open vessels in the barn and so 
absorb the odors. 
On the general farm the good effect of silage on the health of the breed- 
ing herd and young stock in winter can hardly be overestimated. It is 
an excellent feed for ewes with lambs. It may be used in small quanti- 
ties for maintaining horses, though it is too sappy to feed work horses. 
It is a significant fact that people who have used silos most are most 
enthusiastic .in their praise. As farming becomes more intensive the 
number of silos will increase. By inducing the dairy farming they are 
destined to be of great service in conserving and restoring soil fertility 
and agricultural prosperity. 
SILOS AND SILAGE. 
F. J. MYERS. 
(Before Cedar County Farmers' Institute.) 
This subject is indeed a broad and very important one, when you con- 
sider the interest of him who tills the soil. 
We are surely playing a losing game, if we simply sow and reap as our 
ancestors for generations have done. Not considering the new and im- 
proved methods of handling what we produce on the farm. The new 
methods presented for the consideration of the farmer are many, and 
each one of us will have to search out those best adapted to his particular 
line. For the man who wants to run a dairy or feed cattle the modern silo 
is the best of them all. It was not my intention to go back to the be- 
ginning of silos until a few days ago, I noticed in the Register and 
Farmer a statement so interesting to me that I will pass it along. The 
first silo built in the United States was in the year 1875, only thirty-four 
