202 
Report on the Practice of Ensilage, 
On January 26th, Mr. Stocks wrote to me as follows : — 
"As promised during my conversation with you at Darlington last 
Tuesday, I have to-day forwarded a sample of the aftergrass silage made in 
the wooden silo 1 named to you. 
" This grass was cut about the 20th of October last during rain, and the 
greater part of it was kid in the field for eight days after being cut, the weather 
being very bad at the time ; in fact we had almost incessant rain until the 
31st, when the last load was carted to the silo. 
"Everybody predicted that it would prove nothing but a dung-heap, it 
was so bad, the grass being quite yellow from exposure, and soaking wet 
when put into the silo. Yet the cattle eat it with relish, and there is no 
diminution in the quantity or quality of the milk after a fortnight's feeding 
from it. 
" I am sending you also by Parcels Post a sample of butter churned last 
week. This butter is the produce of cattle fed from this silage during the 
last fortnight ; and for eleven weeks previous, from the silage produced in 
my concrete silo, which was put in last July and opened on the 20th of 
October, a sample of which I am also sending you ; and although it is not 
quite so good as it has been (being now nearly finished), 3^ou will, I think, 
admit that it is good silage. The only food that has been given to my cattle 
has been 50 lbs. of silage, 4 lbs. of Indian meal, and 2 lbs. of bran, each cow 
per day. 
" I am agreeably surprised to find that there is not the slightest mould 
to be seen in my wooden silo, and we have now got well into the second 
cutting, or section, so that I may safely assume that if there had been mould, 
it would have been seen ere this. 
" I send herewith drawings of a wooden silo similar to mine, showing 
the press, springs, &c. The cost of a wooden silo this size, 20 feet by 10 feet, 
Fig. 7. — Cover of Wooden Silo, showing the means of distributing 
the Pressure. 
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by 10 feet deep, with press complete, is 50?., and its capacity 40 tons. It is 
coated with a solution of carbon inside and out, to preserve the wood from 
the decaying action of the juices of the grass. I ma}' also state that the 
press and springs can be aiij)lied to any silo of the same size at a cost of 18?., 
and the springs, when closed, show a pressure of 150 lbs. to the square foot 
