(1) Black winter oata sown. 



(2) Crop out on July 12, 1920. It w'as quite 

 mature. Oats had just passed milk 

 stage and tares were well seeded. 



(3) Crop allowed to wilt one or two day.s 

 before carting. 



(4) Silage made in commercial silo; maxi- 

 mum temj^erature of fermentation wa.s 

 35° C. Silage brown in colour with 

 somewhat pungent odour. 



(5) Seeds of both oats and tares in silage 

 contained much solid food material. 



H. E. Woodman 161 



It is of interest to examine the possible reasons for these wide 

 variations in the results for the two silages, since obviously a practical 

 point of some importance is involved. The differences in the procedures 

 by which the two crops were produced are noted below in parallel 

 columns. 



Sn,.u;E 1920-21. Silage 1921-22. 



(1) Grey winter oats sown. 



(2) Croji cut on June 23, 1921. Crop was 

 immature and ideal for hay. Oats were 

 just commg into mUk and tares were in 

 full flower. 



(3) Crop carted within three hours of 

 cutting. 



(4) Silage made in miniature ailo. Tempera- 

 ture of fermentation did not exceed 

 25° C. Silage green in colour with 

 pleasant fruity smell. 



(5) Silage contained very few tare pods and 

 no tare seeds, and oat husks did not 

 contain solid food material. 



The first set of conditions is customarily regarded as ideal for silage. 

 The results of this investigation, however, indicate that early cutting 

 and carting without wilting may lead to a great gain in palatability, 

 digestibility and nutritive value of the silage, although, of course, the 

 actual weight of forage carted may be somewhat smaller per acre. 



The chief results obtained in the present exjDeriment on the compara- 

 tive digestibilities of the three types of fodder are, with the exception of 

 the protein figures, in fair agreement with the results obtained in 

 American investigations with corn forage. These results, which are the 

 averages from a large number of trials, not necessarily strictly compara- 

 tive, have been summarised earlier in the paper. It will be noted that 

 the digestibilities of the total dry matter, total organic matter and crude 

 protein are of a similar order in all three cases. The uncorrected figures 

 for protein digestibihty indicated that the hay protein was distinctly 

 more digestible than the protein of the silage and the green fodder, but 

 on taking into account the metabohc nitrogen of the faeces, the in- 

 equaUties are almost wiped out. 



It would be anticipated that striking differences would occur in the 

 digestion coefficients of the ether extracts. The ether extract of the green 

 forage is about half absorbed; in the case of the hay, the availability 

 sinks to about 37 per cent., whilst with the silage ether extract, which 

 contains the easily assimilated organic acids, the relatively high figure of 

 73 per cent, is reached. It is not to be assumed, however, that the organic 

 acids of the silage possess the nutritive quahties of the soluble carbo- 

 hydrates of the green fodder from which they have arisen during ensilage. 



