34 SILAGE IN BEEP PRODUCTION. 



grazing them. This is only natural when we consider that 

 an acre of corn yielding eight tons of silage will keep four 

 cows 180 days, while an acre of pasture will keep only one 

 cow that long." 



It is a mistake for the feeder to regard either silage 

 or hay as a satisfactory substitute for the other, to the 

 extent of entirely replacing one with the other. Says Mr. 

 C. F. Curtiss of the Iowa Experiment Station: 



"The chief cause of complaint in the use of silage 

 arises from the fact that it is too often regarded as a 

 complete ration. The use of silage does not dispense with 

 the use of grain, except in case of "very moderate feeding 

 for maintenance, without much reference to grain. Where 

 good corn silage is used it may usually be substituted for 

 about two-thirds the hay and about one-third the grain 

 that would be used in full feeding, without the silage. 



"Clover hay is well adapted to supplement silage to 

 correct the excessive acidity of heavy silage feeding and 

 also to furnish the protein nutrients in which silage is 

 lacking. It should not be left out of the ration when feed- 

 ing silage." 



Prof. Plumb of the Ohio Agricultural College has this 

 to say on the subject: 



"If silage is fed under cover, and to cattle not wallowing 

 in mud or oozy manure, then good results will generally 

 come from its use. However, hay or other dry roughage 

 should also be fed. Silage fed twice a day and hay once 

 should give good results. When cattle are being finished 

 for shipment, then the amount of silage fed should be 

 reduced and the dry roughage increased, this to prevent 

 much shrinkage in shipping. However, in what is known 

 as rational feeding, but little shrinkage is apt to occur 

 from the use of the silage. In experiments with steers 

 fed different rations at the Virginia station, those fed 

 silage showed no appreciable shrinkage in the market 

 over those fed exclusively dry feed. 



"In feeding experiments conducted at the Missouri 

 station in 1906-7 with steers weighing about 800 pounds 

 each at the beginning, those fed silage ate less dry matter 

 than those fed whole stover or shredded stover and gained 

 in weight, while the dry stover lots lost. The same sort 

 of result* were also secured from feeding siloed stover 

 compared with air-dried material." 



