502 THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



How to Cut the Maize for the Silo. Various and repeated experiments have 

 proven the fact that the finer the ensilage is cut, the better the preservation in the silo, other 

 conditions being equal. Since it is essential to the perfect preservation of green fodder 

 that all fermentation must be prevented, and this cannot be prevented without entirely 

 excluding the air (as air furnishes the means of combustion or fermentation) this can best be 

 accomplished by having the maize cut in very short pieces, as it requires less room and packs 

 more densely in the silo, leaving less space for the air to occupy. 



More time and labor will, of course, be required to cut the fodder four or five-tenths of 

 an inch in length, than to cut it three or four inches, but its good preservation when thus 

 cut fully compensates for all the labor required. 



Many of the large ensilage cutters, when run by steam power, will make from twenty- 

 five hundred to three thousand cuts per minute, thus cutting as fast as two men can spread it 

 in the silo. The great secret of success in ensilage, as thus far indicated by experience, is in 

 the exclusion of air, which, as previously specified, is secured by short cutting, and dense 

 packing. M. Goffart says on this subject: 



&quot;The fineness to which the maize is cut at the moment of ensilation, is extremely impor 

 tant in view of good preservation. Cut in disks of only one centimetre thick, the maize 

 packs better in the silo, it occupies less space, and takes the form and consistency of a species 

 of pulp, leaving in its mass the least possible amount of air. In proportion as the length is 

 increased, the preservation becomes less perfect, and finishes by being entirely defective. 

 Last year a cultivator of the valley of the Loire took from me the dimensions of my elliptic 

 silo, and reproduced it exactly on his own farm. He filled it in the autumn, and when he 

 opened it during the winter, he took out a poorly-preserved product, which his beasts only 

 eat with repugnance. Greatly disappointed, he brought to me a sample of his maize that he had 

 cut in lengths of five to six centimetres, instead of one or two at most, as I had advised him. 

 I recognized at once the cause of his failure, and asked him why, contrary to my advice, he 

 had cut it so long. He replied, I was not able to procure a steam engine which I expected 

 to use, and I had to use a horse-power; the work did not get along fast enough, and in order 

 to hasten it, I decided to cut it in such long pieces. He was surprised at the excellent pres 

 ervation of the maize at Burtin, and he carried home a hundred kilogrammes; his cattle 

 were thus enabled to appreciate the difference. I cite this fact because it contains a valuable 

 lesson. 



At the beginning of my ensilages I had as principal resource for the sustenance of my 

 stock a great quantity of wheat, oat, and rye straw, etc. In order to induce my cattle to eat 

 it, I mixed all that I could with my maize and my green cut rye, but I was not slow to notice 

 that this mixture kept much less time, as the proportion of straw was greater. A fiftieth in 

 volume, or a tenth in weight, was the maximum of what the maize could carry without being 

 exposed to an early alteration; when I increased this quantity, the time that it kept always 

 diminished, and at last did not exceed forty-eight hours. I attribute this to the fact that the 

 straw, being very dry, absorbs from the maize too much of its water. The moist condition 

 of the ensilages, instead of being a cause of deterioration, is, on the contrary, to a certain 

 extent, indispensable to the good preservation of the whole matter. 



Maize in its normal condition contains about eighty-five per cent, of water; when the 

 addition of dry straw has caused the mixture to decline to an average holding less than 

 seventy-five per cent., the good preservation is much compromised, and quickly becomes 

 impossible if we try to go below it. Besides the too great dehydratation that the 

 presence of the straw may cause, it also offers another serious inconvenience, especially 

 rye straw. This straw when cut forms a great quantity of little tubes, the envelopes 

 of which resist decomposition for a long time; these tubes inclose an appreciable 



