ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 187 



try by breeding and sending out beef cattle for dairy cows, I will 

 turn over a new leaf and not do it any more. 



I met a man down street a while ago and he asked me how 

 I liked my silo. I suppose you have had the subject of the silo 

 at your meeting here, but if you have not you missed an im- 

 portant subject, and I think I will tell you the same as I did 

 him, that I feel that I ought to hire a kicking machine and make 

 a public exhibition of myself for not building it long ago, as a 

 warnings to the rest of the dairy farmers. A year ago I paid out 

 between six and seven hundred dollars for feeding on my farm, 

 and it kept me awake nights to know where I would get money 

 to pay for it. I built a silo last spring, and I have so much feed 

 now it keeps me awake nights to know what to do with it. 



Xow I am going to tell you what my silo cost. I built a 

 silo that holds what the silo people said was 150 tons, according 

 to silo measurement; but I got in 176 loads and we weighed 

 twelve loads and they weighed 2200 pounds each, and there was 

 very little difference in any of the loads. I built that silo for 

 $178, but I got bit in the building a little. I can replace it today 

 for $160. I rilled that silo without a dollar of expense — I am 

 not out a dollar to fill that silo. That may be a statement you 

 cannot see through, but any of you can do the same thing. 

 Three of us in the place had silos — two built our silos at the same 

 time, the other had one. I admit that I bought the cutter, 

 another man had the engine, and the other man furnished the 

 binder and team. We filled the three silos in nine and a half 

 days by changing work, and are not out a dollar for filling 

 them except for the gasoline, and I have the best lot of feed 1 

 ever had or could have. It is possible for you to do this. We 

 have no advantage over you and we accomplished those results, 

 we three neighbors in Iowa. It took five teams and eight men. 



Mr. Van Horn: — Those were regular laborers, were they? 



Mr. Shilling : — The men on my farm and the other two 

 farms. 



Question :■ — What was the capacity of the three silos ? 



