FARM MANAGEMENT 



135 



7. Crops unfit for making hay will often make a nutritious, 

 palatable silage and thus enable the farmer to carry his stock dur- 

 ing times when hay crops are a failure. 



8. The use of silage enables the feeding of a succulent and 

 uniform food the entire year. Silage is beneficial to digestion and 

 general health of animals. It is a mild laxative and keeps the di- 

 gestive system about in the same condition as when animals are 

 on pasture or being fed with green fodders. The feeding of silage 

 previous to turning animals out to pasture is beneficial and prevents 

 the loss in weight which frequently occurs. 



Every farmer who is interested in the feeding and maintenance 

 of live stock should have a silo. Silage is not so satisfactory as a 

 feed for horses as for beef and dairy cattle and sheep, but fed in 

 conjunction with some other ration has been found to be beneficial 

 to horses. 



Size of Silo. The size of the silo should be determined by 

 the amount of stock to be fed and the length of the silage feeding 

 season. In most sections the silage should be available from six 

 to seven months. Silage is usually fed to cows and steers at the 

 rate of 30 to 40 pounds per day. This would mean that in 200 

 days a cow would require from 3 to 4 tons of silage. These figures 

 give a safe basis for calculating the requirements of a herd. The 

 size of the silo should be such as to make it possible to feed daily 

 from the whole surface of the silo to a depth of two inches ; so as to 

 prevent loss by undue exposure of the silage to the atmosphere and 

 keep it in the best condition for feeding. Silage weighs from 30 to 

 50 pounds per cubic foot. Good corn silage averages about 35 to 40 

 pounds. Clover and cowpeas silage weigh more than corn silage. 

 One acre of corn should yield from 10 to 15 tons of silage and one 

 acre of clover, vetch, cowpeas, rye, etc., should yield from 8 to 10 

 tons of silage. Only circular silos are now being constructed, and 

 the following table gives the approximate capacity of silos in tons. 

 From these figures a farmer may easily plan his silo and the area 

 of silage crops to meet his requirements: 



