56 MAINE AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. I915. 



Washington County Farm, being 630 bushels per acre, or 18.9 

 tons. It required 130 man hours and 45 horse hours per acre 

 to grow and harvest these turnips. 



Rutabaga turnips carry about 11 per cent of dry matter. 

 Corn silage from thoroughly matured field corn will have nearly 

 19 per cent of dry matter, and silage from immature corn car- 

 ries about 14 per cent dry matter. There have not been many 

 digestion experiments made with rutabagas, but those that have 

 been made show that rutabagas are considerably more digestible 

 than silage made from the entire corn plant. Corn silage has 

 about 70 per cent of its organic matter digestible and ruta- 

 bagas have 91 per cent. About 55 per cent of the protein of 

 corn silage is digestible while 80 per cent of the protein or ruta- 

 bagas is digestible. Less than 75 per cent of the nitrogen-free 

 extract (the soluble carbohydrates) of corn silage is digested 

 while 95 per cent of the nitrogen-free extract of turnips is 

 digested. 



In the experiments carried on by the Maine Experiment 

 Station it has been found as a result of seven trials that with 

 Maine matured field corn there was an average yield of 11 tons 

 per acre. This carried 4225 pounds of total dry matter of 

 which 3075 pounds were digestible. With the much larger irh- 

 mature Southern corn grown in comparison, as a result of seven 

 trials, the yields were 17 tons of silage per acre; This carried 

 5000 pounds of dry matter and 3250 pounds of digestible dry 

 matter. Approximately 19 tons per acre of rutabagas grown at 

 Highmoor Farm in 19 14 carried about 4200 pounds of dry 

 matter of which more than 3800 pounds were digestible, or con- 

 siderably in excess of the digestible dry matter produced per 

 acre in an average crop of silage corn. The 23^ tons of ruta- 

 bagas grown at Mr. Washburn's farm in Perry carried two tons 

 and a half of digestible dry matter or about a ton more per acre 

 than was carried in the mature Maine field corn as found as 

 the result of seven trials by this Station. 



As stated at the beginning a ton of digestible dry matter can 

 probably be grown cheaper per ton as corn than in the form of 

 roots. The corn crop can be handled more completely by ma- 

 chinery and has many other advantages. But to the man who 

 has late land, or to one who needs succulent food and has not a 

 silo, or to one in a locality where corn does not thrive well, 



