32 SILOS, ENSILAGE AND SILAGE. 



root pulp, and maize, on an extensive scale. The beet 

 leaves from a crop of 400 acres were preserved in a dozen 

 silos, and the beet root pulp from his large sugar factory 

 had been stored for winter feeding, in the same way. 

 He had lived for a number of years in the United States, 

 and on his return to Germany began the cultivation of 

 the large dent corn (mais dent de cheval). As this 

 " giant maize" did not always ripen in the climate of 

 Stuttgardt, he became interested in utilizing it as a for- 

 age crop when the season was too short for the grain to 

 mature. 



The first account of his experience was in a letter pub- 

 lished in a German paper in 1862, and he gave further 

 details in another letter to the same paper, dated Sep- 

 tember 23d, 1865. These letters were translated and 

 published in the Journal d'agriculture Pratique in 1870, 

 forming part of a series of articles on the ensilage of 

 green fodder, by M. Vilmorin-Andrieux, who called the 

 attention of the farmers of France to the advantages of 

 this method of preserving fodder, in connection with the 

 growing of forage crops, as a remedy for the effects of 

 the prevailing severe drought of that year. * 



From these papers it appears that M. Eeihlen was 

 familiar with the sour hay process of Germany, and that 

 his success in the ensilage of beet leaves, and beet root 

 pulp, for a number of years, led him to try the same 

 method with maize, in various stages of ripeness, with 

 stalks and ears together, and separately, and also mixed 

 with beet root pulp. 



The results obtained in these different methods were 

 satisfactory, but he was so well pleased with the ensilage 

 of maize, by itself, that he increased the area of corn 



* It is a matter of interest, in the history of ensilage, that the severe drought of 

 1870 had much to do with the rapid progress of the system in France from that 

 time to the present, while in England the introduction and diffusion of the prac- 

 tice was owing to "a succession of wet seasons, which had rendered hay making 

 almost impossible in some localities." Jenkins, in Jour. Eoy. Agr'l Soc., 1884, 

 p. 136. 



