EIGHTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART X. 619 



it is a cutter. For this reason many buy the latter and depend on being 

 able to rent the former when it is needed. The next best arrangement 

 to owning an outfit individually is for two or three farmers in the same 

 neighborhood to buy the necessary machinery in partnership. 



The owners of farms Nos. 14, 17. and 26 bought a silage cutter to- 

 gether. At filling time each man furnishes two laborers and one team 

 while the others are filling. By varying the seeding time in the spring 

 they have been able to control the time of harvesting so that all three 

 get their silos filled with corn in good condition. 



THE SILO FOR IOWA FARMS. 

 Martin Rittenhour. loica State Register and Farmer. 



I believe I voice the opinion of all when I say that in this day of ad- 

 vancement and with high-priced land we can ill afford to take a backward 

 step. I wish to say a few words about siloG and their importance to the 

 Iowa farmer. It is a well known fact that we take to new things very 

 slowly and we are all too slow in availing ourselves of such improvements 

 over old methods that appear to be beneficial. In my opinion nothing can 

 be of more real value to the modern farmer who owns his farm than the 

 silo. It was some years before I could convince myself that the silo was 

 the thing for me to build on my farm. I studied silos, made inquiries about 

 them and finally I visited a farm where a farmer had had one for three 

 or four years and in talking to him I became fully convinced that prosper- 

 ity and a silo went hand in hand. 



Deciding to build one 1 built a silo sixteen feet in diameter and thirty 

 feet high, not including the foundation. For machinery to fill it I used 

 a self-feed cutter with a 36-foot elevator run by a gasoline engine. With 

 this machine we can cut and, elevate from six to eight tons per hour. If 

 I have to haul the corn very far I use four teams and five wagons, with 

 one man in the field to help load and one in the silo to help pack the cut 

 corn. After having had some experience I believe it a most excellent plan 

 to keep the silage well tramped. It begins to ferment in two or three 

 days. In filling I fill the silo as full as I can and then in a few days 

 1 fill it again after it has become settled. For teams, men and gasoline it 

 costs me about $30 per day. It requires about one and one-half days to fill 

 it at first and about a half day to complete it after it has settled. 



My silo will hold about one hundred tons of silage and it costs me about 

 $70 to put it up and care for that amount of first class feed. It requires 

 from ten to twelve acres to fill the silo and the nearer the corn is to ma- 

 turity the better the silage for feed. Moisture is necessary to preserve 

 the silage and if the silo is filled in a dry time or when the corn is very 

 ripe water will have to be supplied, which is most conveniently done by 

 pumping it into the elevator as the cut corn is being elevated. A good 

 time to fill a silo is of a damp day when it is too wet to thresh. 



I regard the feeding qualities of silage the very best cheap feed we 

 can provide. It has given me the best results when fed with a grain ra- 

 tion, but 1 have been fairly successful in feeding it alone. WTien my 

 stock has plenty of it they care but very little for hay. I feed it to all 

 kinds of stock, even the hogs seem to relish and enjoy a ration of silage. 



