84 H. E. STEVENS ON ENSILAGE. 



and more especially the unfavorable nature of the soil, interfered 

 with this plan ; and the silo is merely a pit like the others, but with 

 one end formed by the briek wall of a hill-side barn. The cattle are 

 stabled in the basement of this barn, and a door will be cut through 

 the partition wall so as to allow of convenient access to the pit. It 

 was filled in the same manner as the two preceding. The corn was 

 cut down Sept. 14 and 15. The weather was clear and diy during 

 the operation, and hence rather unfavorable. 43,538 pounds of 

 corn were first put down. For the sake of experiment, a thousand 

 pounds of common hay, five hundred pounds of clover hay, and five 

 hundred pounds of straw, were packed down in alternate kr^ers with 

 the corn in different portions of the silo. The upper part was filled 

 with 5,165 pounds of German millet, treated in the same way as the 

 corn. The millet was cut on the 16th of September. It was just 

 out of bloom. The filling took four days, and the mass settled down 

 greatly during that time. The pit was not quite full. A layer of 

 about six inches of straw was put on top of the ensilage ; boards 

 laid above this, in the manner already described, and twenty-one 

 thousand six hundred pounds of old brick placed above all, to give 

 the desired weight. This weight gave a pressure of one hundred 

 and eight pounds to the cubic foot. The pit is covered by a simple 

 shed. 



From a careful comparison of the published results of numerous 

 experiments, I have every reason to believe that corn will keep as 

 well in pits dug in the naked clay, as in bricked-up and cemented 

 silos, provided the clay is dry and compact. The chief drawback to 

 the use of such pits is their liability to cave in when emptied of the 

 ensilage in the spring. If this can be prevented by temporaiy sup- 

 ports, props, etc., then my experience and observation, thus far, is 

 in favor of this kind of silo, the cheapest and the simplest yet 

 described. A correspondent of " The Country Gentleman " contends 

 that ensilage will keep better in such pits. He states that he has 

 experimented for a number of years past with brewer's grain, en- 

 deavoring to discover the best mode of keeping it. He has tried 

 stone, brick, and cemented vaults, barrels and wooden vats, and 

 found none to compare with pits dug in a good clay or other dry 

 soil. He is inclined to attribute the superiority of these to the pre- 

 servative action of the soil itself. 



There may be something in this. Soils are known to possess 

 remarkable absorptive and antiseptic properties. It is more than 



