498 THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



indebted for the illustration of M. Goffart s silos: &quot;The earth silo has been used by Mr. 

 Francis Morris more than by anyone else in this country. His soil in Maryland consists of 

 clay for a foot or two and a kind of rotten rock beneath. He uses oxen and a scraper, and 

 makes a trench or pit 5 feet deep, 7^ feet wide on the bottom, and 1 1 feet wide on the top, 

 and any length desired. A width of 1 1 feet on top prevents danger of arching. At this 

 slope the sides remain firm, and he does not plaster the face. The surface water is drained 

 from it. In filling it, the sides are lined with straw standing, so that the ensilage will slip 

 down well. The bottom is floored with plank, the top rounded up and covered with a thin 

 layer of long straw, the thinner the better; above that a sheet of tarred roofing felt, and 

 above that the earth is piled on two feet deep. The cut stalks are pounded in, and rolled 

 with a heavy roller frequently at first. Vigilance is the price of safety with an earth silo. 

 He has recently built more of them, all radiating from a center where the cutter stands, so 

 that he can fill all without moving his machinery. He can cut ten tons per hour with a six- 

 horse engine. The stalks are hauled from the field in advance in the morning, in order to 

 keep the machine going. He still uses two masonry silos in the stone barn, which were the 

 first pits built for the purpose in this country; those, however, are also covered with dirt and 

 compressed until they have ceased to settle. Mr. Morris thinks very much of ensilage as a 

 forerunner of great wheat crops. He says: &quot;Clover, with its long roots, drawing susten 

 ance from the sub-soil, when plowed under, and barnyard manure in abundance, will keep 

 land strong for wheat and other exhaustive crops, such as cannot now be raised profitably in 

 the Eastern States. 



I made use of Indian corn as winter food for stock as long ago as the winter o&quot;f 1876, 

 and I have used it in each succeeding winter with great success. The earlier it is sown the 

 better; its growth is more rapid and luxuriant in May and June than in July and August 

 a bushel of corn to the acre, in drills twelve to fifteen inches apart. The crop should be 

 worked twice, and, when in tassel, should be cut by a mowing machine, carried from the 

 field in wagons to the feed-cutter, cut up in pieces of about three-quarters of an inch, and put 

 into the silo prepared for ij. The trench should have a shed over it, or a shed thatched 

 with straw. Water should be kept from the cut-up maize, as it would doubtless injure the 

 quality, if not destroy it. 



Maize or Indian corn requires from forty-five to sixty days to ripen it into tassel, and 

 therefore it can be safely sown up to the 15th of July. If the land is in good condition, it 

 will yield twenty tons to the acre; it requires a ton a month for each cow, and all animals 

 will improve and do well upon it. By the use of superphosphates the crop can be doubled, 

 but this is a matter subject to the will of the farmer. Ten acres of maize will feed thirty 

 cows during the season that they cannot feed out of doors, and will furnish a quantity of 

 manure to give a wheat or corn crop. The advantage of this crop is so great that it must 

 change the agriculture of every corn-growing country. 



Cattle and sheep will be raised on every farm to an extent heretofore not thought of. 

 &quot;Wheat, to-day, by all our best farmers, is followed by clover, the clover is cut and made into 

 hay, and this is fed to the stock. Maize will take the place of clover -hay, and the clover will 

 be grazed off the land, and the animals will return it to the land better prepared to act as a 

 manure than if the clover was cut, made into hay, carried to the barn, and then fed to the 

 stock. The advantage of grazing clover off the land is very great, as it at once returns to it 

 all that the clover takes from the sod. 



We recommend every farmer who reads these suggestions to sow an acre of land with 

 corn or maize if you have no drill, sow it broadcast, and when in tassel, use any old mowing 

 machine you may have to cut it down, and then if you have no feed -cutter, buy or borrow 

 one and cut up the fodder, as ordered bury it in the ground, and when winter comes feed 

 your stock upon it, and when you try it once you will never be without it again. I have 



