IS ENSILAGE A SUCCESS? IGl 



16. As food for cuttle, us well us other kinds of farm 

 stock, ensiluge forms a good and very cheap substitute for 

 roots, and its condimental cfFec?ts are especially apparent. 

 But the usual ensilage crops fail to till the place of the root 

 crop in a judicious farm rotation. 



17. In feeding, the best results follow a moderate ration 

 of ensilage, rather than its entire substitution for dry, coarse 

 fodder. Except in the case of animals fed to maintain their 

 weight, ensilage cannot be recommended as a substitute for 

 more than half the Ions; fora2:e consumed. 



18. Ensilage, and especially good corn ensilage, when 

 compared with dry corn fodder, or with other feeding stuffs, 

 produces results so satisfactory as to surprise the chemist 

 and which chemistry cannot explain. As the result of prac- 

 tical feeding tests, it is very generally agreed that three tons 

 of corn ensilage will equal in its effects as food a ton of 

 average hay. This means that a farmer is as well off, if not 

 better, with thirty tons of good corn ensilage and twenty 

 tons of hay, as with thirty tons of hay. But it does not 

 mean that a man can winter stock as well with ninety tons 

 of ensilage and no dry forage, as with thirty tons of hay and 

 no ensilage. 



19. A silo or two, well built but not too large or too 

 expensive, will be convenient and economical on most farms, 

 to convei-t w^aste products into edible forage and to save 

 crops which at other times might be lost, if not to preserve 

 some crop specially grown for ensilage. 



20. The silo system is best adapted to high-priced lands 

 and so-called high-farming, and to farms not suited to profit- 

 able grass m'owinir. 



O o c 



21. The extensive use of ensilage upon any farm is 

 chiefly a question of convenience and economy which local 

 conditions must decide. 



The Chairman. I want to call before you a gentleman 

 whom we shall not have the pleasure of hearing unless I call 

 him at this time. lie is a gentleman Ions: tried in the service 

 of agriculture and we shall all be glad to listen to him — 

 Secretary Gold of the State Board of Agriculture of Con- 

 necticut. [Applause.] 



