30 SILAGE IN BEEP PRODUCTION. 



It furnishes the best means of storing the entire corn crop, 

 a part of which is now only partially utilized in the corn 

 belt, with minimum waste. Experiment stations have been 

 gradually but surely teaching us its usefulness in the 

 feeding of beef cattle. Practical feeders here and there 

 have been carefully trying it out, and with but very few 

 exceptions where the beef producer has erected a silo, 

 filled it with corn and fed it out to his beef cattle he has 

 become a silage-for-beef-cattle convert. 



Silage is undoubtedly of especial value in the feeding 

 of beef breeding cows and in the wintering of calves 

 and young cattle intended for beef production. The 

 Illinois experiment station has determined the eco- 

 nomic importance of the silo in beef production in the 

 state when used in connection with the feeding of beef 

 cows and young cattle. This importance might be briefly 

 stated as follows: 



"Corn silage when supplemented with oats and hay, 

 used for wintering calves intended for beef production, 

 will produce thirty-five pounds more gain per steer during 

 the season at the same cost of ration than when shock 

 corn similarly supplemented is fed. This extra gain is 

 worth 5 cents per pound, or $1.75 per calf. There are 

 over 700,000 calves wintered in Illinois each year. 



"It should be borne in mind that the cattle feeders 

 who are apparently succeeding best with silage are those 

 who buy young, light-weight feeders weighing from 600 

 to 1,000 pounds, feeding them silage in largest amounts at 

 the beginning of the fattening period, providing abundant 

 shelter, and that in most instances the silage is withdrawn 

 from the ration several weeks before the cattle are fin- 

 ished, and who do not depend upon silage exclusively. 

 Several practical feeders have expressed the opinion that 

 the main utility of silage is to prepare cattle for heavy 

 feeding by putting them in condition to feed well; that 

 as an appetizer and a laxative it has great value in start- 

 Ing cattle on feed." 



The Investigations of the Ohio and Indiana Stations 



