1^594 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
519 
top of locust above the ground, using short locust or 
Red cedar in the ground. A few temporary supports 
will be needed urder the ridgepole all along in the 
center. The bars should be of the best and clearest 
White pine or cypress to IK inch wide, by 2 to 2K 
inches deep, properly rabbeted to receive the glass, 
and with a groove on each side in about the middle of 
the bar to catch and lead off the condensation or drip 
from the under side of the glass. Get bars the proper 
length, so as to cut to advantage and not waste. 
Ventilators. 
On the roof facing the south, must be proper ven¬ 
tilators the entire length. These should be made in 
frames, two feet wide by from four to six feet long 
each, and be hinged on a purlin running the entire 
length of the house, two feet down from the ridge¬ 
pole and fastened between the rafters or extra heavy 
bars which should be put from four to six feet apart, 
according to the length of the ventilators. The pur¬ 
lin should be slightly framed into these rafters or 
double extra bars, so as to come flush with the bars. 
Outside rafters should be two inches thick by four 
or five inches deep. Use galvanized washtray hinges 
with brass pins, and hinge on purlin plates, thus ven¬ 
tilating away from the ridge or highest point. This 
mode of ventilating is considered by far the best, as it 
simply allows the surplus hot air to pass out at the 
top, and causes no draft. Fasten the bars with small- 
head wire nails, at the ridge as well as on the gutter 
strip. Prime the entire woodwork with a thin coat 
of white lead and raw linseed oil; give the wood all it 
will absorb. 
The house is now ready to glaze. Use 8xl0-inch or 
larger glass, either third quality French or second 
quality American. Bed the glass into putty. Have 
the putty soft and pliable, and run it into the rabbet, 
then press the lights in gently but firmly ; start at 
the bottom. Let the lower light just fairly project 
over or on to the gutter strip, put one or two small 
broad-headed galvanized na'ls under the lower pane 
or light into the gutter strip, then use shoemaker’s 
brads and regular glazier’s points for glazing. Let 
the lap net be over a quarter to three-eighths of an 
inch. After glazing, clean off the putty inside, and 
have the crevices well filled and smeothed. Give one 
k ood heavy coat of white lead and raw oil paint both 
in and outside, and the roof will be good and tight. 
H. A SIE BRECHT, 
A SYMPOSIUM ON SILOS. 
WHY USE WATER IN THE SILO? 
On page 104, The R. N.- Y. said : “ It is settled that 
it is a good thing to add water as the silo is filled,’ and 
in the same issue, various persons tell about their silo¬ 
filling. L. D. G. says that he had trouble from the sides 
not keeping well, studied the cause and found it. The 
sides of the silo took out the moisture, so that the en¬ 
silage did not keep ; he put moisture around the sides 
and the ensilage kept all right. J. S. Woodward had 
the same trouble with the same hind of silo ; he found 
that the silo was not air-tight, and remedied it by put¬ 
ting on extra boarding inside, making it air-tight. The 
ensilage was all right without wetting. The trouble 
with the silos of H. Talcott and L. D. G. was that they 
would keep ensilage when first filled, just as well as 
a pail that has set in the sun all summer, will hold 
water. Both must be swelled with moisture before 
they are air-tight. It is not the corn that needs the 
water, but the silo. L. D. G. says, don’t use coal 
tar. Why ? Simply because the silo will not swell 
air-tight so quickly where the tar is used. That kind 
of advice should apply only to single-board silos. 
H. Talcott said that any kind of silo will keep ensi¬ 
lage, provided it is wet. I do not dispute the fact that 
a silo built as recommended, if the lumber is perfect, 
can be swelled air-tight, and keep ensilage all right. 
Yet I can imagine no place to put a board to take the 
life out of it, which equals that where one side is wet 
and the other side free to the air. I think such advice 
causes much loss, as few people understand how per¬ 
fect the boards must be to make a perfectly aii -tight 
silo, with one thickness of boarding. I have in mind 
one made of matched and planed spruce, which the 
second year, must have caused more loss than the cost 
of double boarding, which was done before it was 
filled again. I presume it was not wet down as 
directed, which might have helped it a little. 
Simply from a business point of view, the double 
boarded silo is much the better. My own, made from 
sapling pine lumber, has been filled seven times, is 
just as tight as ever, and I see no reason why it will 
not be for years to come. A silo made as directed by 
J. S. Woodward, with the same kind of lumber, I 
think will outlast more than two single boarded, and 
will not have to be swelled up every season to make 
it tight. But when water is recommended, I think 
it best to understand why it is needed, although I can¬ 
not believe that those who now have tight silos would 
see any reason for using it. The use of coal tar, as I 
understand it, is to preserve the silo, not the ensilage. 
If the silo has a good, planed surface, it will keep the 
ensilage just as well. There has been a very large 
amount of waste from improperly built silos. If The 
R. N.-Y. could induce every farmer having a loss from 
that cause, to improve his silo, and save what he now 
loses, it would more than pay for its subscription list. 
H. O. MEAD. 
The Building of a Round Silo. 
Last fall, through information gained from The 
R. N.-Y., I built a silo with grand success. I built a 
round one, because The R. N.-Y. said that this shape 
gave the best satisfaction. I excavated about three 
feet, and built a wall of stone two feet above ground, 
making it five feet from the bottom, with a ditch 
about one foot in depth filled with stone to carry off 
any water that might be inclined to run in. Then I 
put on the sills of 2x4 inch scantling, placed the 
studding in position, 24 feet long and stay-lathed 
them, care being taken to have them plumb. The 
studding were 2x4. I began with the inside lining, 
but should have put on the outside first; I used three 
courses of boards with paper between each course. 
The boards were one-half inch thick, six inches wide 
and 16 feet long. All the lumber so far was hemlock 
and cost $14 per thousand. 
All of this went on nicely, but not so with the out¬ 
side, as we had much trouble from its breaking. The 
studding had become so rigid that nothing but the 
best pine siding would stand the bending. The out¬ 
side was covered with paper, then with beveled pine 
siding, rabbeted one-half inch. My roof was built by 
placing a circular frame five feet in diameter at the 
top, and niiling boards to it and to the plate ; the 
boards were six inches wide and eight feet long, slit 
obliquely from one corner to the other, making each 
board one inch wide at one end and five inches at the 
other. The boards were then grooved on the edges, 
one-half inch deep, then nailed to the circular frame 
and plate, placing the narrow end up ; the joints were 
The Late E. Williams. Fig. 136. (See page 524.) 
then battened. The circular frame was then covered 
with a galvanized iron cupola with a conical hood to 
secure ventilation, which I find is very necessary. 
The window for filling and to let in light, is on the 
top of the roof and is of the dormer type. This makes 
a building 16 feet in diameter from outside to outside, 
and 30 feet deep from the bottom to the top of the 
plate, which will hold between 80 and 90 tons and is 
an ornament to any farm, and gives perfect ensilage 
to the very edge. This building cost me $250 com¬ 
plete, besides my own time and that of one month 
hand for nearly two weeks. m. s. w. 
Silo Failures in Washington. 
This is not a corn country, but we can beat the 
world on clover, peas and grasses. It is, therefore, of 
the greatest importance for us to make a success of 
ensiloing those crops. So far, however, in this county, 
all attempts have resulted in failures, as the follow¬ 
ing notes will show. I first experimented, having 
seen in the Report of the Proceedings of the Second 
Ensilage Congress, in New York, January 24-25, 1883, 
that Mr. J. B. Brown described what he called “ J. B. 
Brown’s $10 silo,” as follows ; “ It was much like a 
bin, single thick, not even matched, second-hand, one- 
inch boards, in the cellar beneath the stable, cost $10, 
and will hold ten tons.” . . , “ Now, you see from 
this that silos need not be air-tight.” 
This was some years ago, and I determined to test 
the subject upon that basis. I therefore built a silo 
in my barn, 12x14x16, with one layer of matched inch- 
board lining, and put in a fine crop of peas and oats, 
cut when the peas were fully formed, and the oats in 
the dough. I cut every morning, with a hand 
scythe, until 10 A. m., and hauled it into the silo each 
afternoon, 44 two-horse loads in all. It took seven 
days to do the job. The heat gradually rose till it 
attained 140 degrees, the highest point, and during 
the time of filling, one would get a delicious fruity 
smell when he came within 200 yards of that silo. 
I was feeling good all over, to think how well pro¬ 
vided for my stock would be the coming winter. I 
covered with old newspapers and about a foot of dam¬ 
aged hay, aid over that with loose boards, weighted 
down with a cord of firewood. When the silo was 
opened, I found a mass of stuff, like wet plugs of to¬ 
bacco, which my cows would only just pick over, and 
reject. Result, failure, credited to faulty construc¬ 
tion of silo (?). 
The same season, a neighbor built a silo the same 
size as mine, and filled it with Timothy. His silo, 
however, was built of green fir boards, one lining, not 
matched. Result, failure, credited to faulty construc¬ 
tion of silo (?). Two other neighbors this past season 
tried their hands at this problem. They both built 
perfectly air-tight silos, double lined, matched inch 
boards, with joints broken, and tar paper between. 
One put in Timothy, filling slowly, and waiting till 
it settled, before covering with old damaged hay. Re¬ 
sult, failure, credited to—? ? The other neighbor also 
had a perfect silo, perfectly air-tight, double lined, 
with tar paper between, 10x10x10, and put in four 
loads of fresh cut clover, the last load being hauled 
while wet, and in the rain. It was covered immediately 
with a load of pea vines, and a layer of plank weighted 
with rock, and over that another large load of pea 
vines. Result, failure, a mass of stuff of the wet to¬ 
bacco plug character, credited to trying to open a 
clover ensilage lock with a corn ensilage key. 
Most of the ensilage literature that I have seen has 
been corn ensilage literature, there being very little 
written about clover or pea ensilage. Therefore, I 
appeal to The R. N.-Y. editors and readers to favor 
us with such information or suggestion as may enable 
me to achieve success later on. I would suggest that 
it will be entirely useless to discuss clover or pea en¬ 
silage from only a corn ensilage experience. But if 
any one has actually practiced making clover or pea 
ensilage, whether resulting in success or failure, and 
will give the details of his experience, and such 
suggestions as may help lead to success, it will be 
received in a thankful and teachable s'parit. I do not 
by any means claim to “ know it all.” The corn ques¬ 
tion, however, is tabooed, as we cannot grow it profit¬ 
ably for climatic reasons. dr. a. w. thornton. 
Sweet Corn Stalks for the Silo. 
Many are asking if sweet corn stalks from which 
the ears have been picked, are suitable for silo pur¬ 
poses. The design of the Creator was that every stalk 
of corn should produce an ear, and if grown in suit¬ 
able surroundings and it does not produce one, it will 
be found to be an abnormal stalk, and not as rich in 
food elements as a stalk on which an ear has grown. 
Even a stalk from which a full-grown ear has been 
picked, will be found to contain more nutriment than 
a sucker. In sweet corn the carbohydrates exist in 
the form of sugar. Picking the ears before full ma¬ 
turity will leave the stalks still actively growing, and 
the carbohydrates which, had the ears been left, 
would have gone into them, will now be found in the 
stalks. Any one, who has given it his attention, will 
have noticed that, soon after the corn is picked, the 
stalks turn quite red, and the juice becomes very 
sweet. If, at this stage, the stalks be cut and put into 
the silo, they make the very best kind of ensilage. 
The objections to using sweet corn for planting for 
the silo are, first, that it is less sure to germinate than 
other corns, and if the weather at planting time is un¬ 
favorable, very much of it will fail to come up, and 
thus the stand will be quite likely to be bad ; second, 
the seed is always mere expensive than other corn; and 
lastly, as before stated, the carbohydrates exist as 
sugar, and hence the fermentation necessary in the 
silo converts it into acid, while in common corn the 
carbohydrates are in the form of starch, and sugar re¬ 
sults from the fermentation. But when sweet corn is 
grown for canning or the market, we have the stalks, 
and this is the best use that can be made of them, and 
they are really very valuable for this purpose. 
J. 8. WOOUWARD. 
SUCCESSFUL IRRIGATION PLANT. 
I have, for some years, successfully used the water 
from a spring on a hill to irrigate my market garden. 
Owing to the abundance of blue clay at the head of 
the spring on the hill, it was an easy job, with plow 
and road scraper, to scoop out a reservoir. In the first 
700 feet, there is an estimated fall of 170 feet, which is 
nearly on a level with the family garden ; 300 feet 
farther, with a slight grade brings it by way of the 
basement cellar into the farm house. The springs 
were good for 40 barrels per day during the drought 
last summer. The main pipe is IK inch, black iron. 
Where the ground was mellow, the pipe was put down 
three feet, but where it was very hard digging, it was 
put from six inches to one foot deeper. The last foot 
was dug out with a mattock, a tool much like a 
carpenter’s ad ze, with a sharp point instead of hammer- 
shaped head. When the mattock was used, the ditch 
was narrowed down to four or five inches. The tool 
