SILAGE AND THE BEEF SUPPLY. 119 



competition. "There was a time," says Breeder's Gazette, "when 

 meats were produced as cheaply in the United States as any- 

 where. That condition no longer exists. To produce meats in 

 the United States costs more money now than to produce them in 

 South America, New Zealand, or Australia. Probably meat pro- 

 duction even in Great Britain is less costly than with us." 



The situation is clearly stated by H. M. Cottrell, Agricultural 

 Commissioner of the Rock Island Lines, as follows: 



"An adequate supply of beef for the United States can be 

 secured only by the stockmen throughout the country adopting 

 silage as the basis of their feed rations both while growing cattle 

 and while fattening them. The cost of making beef with grain 

 and dry forage is greater than the majority of the consumers can 

 pay for it and farmers find it more profitable to sell grain than to 

 feed it. A careful feeding test showed that taking a steer from 

 birth to three years of age when he was marketed fat, it required 

 38 pounds of feed for each pound of gain. An average of a large 

 number of feeding tests in many states showed that with dry 

 feeds 10 pounds of grain and 5 pounds of hay were required for 

 each pound of gain made while fattening beef animals. Grain is 

 worth at least one cent a pound and hay is worth half a cent. Fig- 

 ure for yourself the cost of making beef with dry feeds. 



"Silage saves a large proportion of grain needed in fattening 

 animals. It saves the need for any grain while cattle are growing. 

 Silage fed cattle gain faster than those on dry feed. They finish 

 quicker and the meat is better marbled. Cattle fed silage while 

 fattening require 30 per cent less grain to make each 100 pounds 

 of increase in weight than do cattle fed under the best methods of 

 dry feeding. Silage makes 50 per cent saving of grain over ordi- 

 nary methods of feeding. On high priced land, silage is of special 

 advantage, as it nearly doubles the carrying capacity of the land. 



"Forty per cent of the feed value of a corn plant is in the stalk 

 and 60 per cent in the ear. The stalks that grow on nearly ninety- 

 five million acres of land are wasted annually in this country and 

 the feed value of the stalks on nearly eight million acres are but 

 partially utilized each year. This annual waste amounts to prac- 

 tically a billion dollars, the greatest economic waste in any one 

 line of business in the world. Silos could convert all this wasted 

 material into one of the best beef producing feeds. 



"Under the ordinary way of roughing beef cattle through the 

 winter a herd averages 200 pounds less in weight per head in the 

 spring than it did in the fall. It costs considerable even with these 

 methods to carry stock cattle through the winter and every one 

 loses in value. Stock cattle fed silage and a little dry forage will 

 gain 100 pounds a head through the winter and increase in value. 

 There are about 37,000,000 beef cattle in the United States. More 



