1901 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
687 
DAIRY AND FARM NDTES. 
I read much In your paper about ailo* 
and I mean to have one another year, but 
a good many farmers and other people are 
very much opposed to silage, for they say 
it will make the milk taste, and that It 
will not keep sweet as long and is not 
wholesome. They call silage rotten stuff. 
I would like the opinion of some of the 
readers of your paper. w. a. w. 
Whallonsburg, N. Y. 
After an experience dating back to 
1883 it seems almost a waste of space 
to speak of silage and its value. The 
number of silos that are yearly being 
built should be sufficient evidence of 
their success, and yet this one question 
is still uppermost: Will silage injure 
the cows, and will their teeth get loose? 
Will it make the milk, butter and cheese 
taste, and other kindred questions. I 
remember a very prolonged discussion 
in southern Wisconsin, where good 
crops abound. W. H. Bradley, who 
was conducting the meeting, made an 
exhaustive argument, backed by years 
of feeding. The writer took a hand by 
telling of his limited experience in feed¬ 
ing 150 animals upon this food, but with¬ 
out a thorough conversion of the multi¬ 
tude. To be honest, I don’t know that 
we made a single convert. I gave them 
an experience with an old cow that had 
just attained her majority, having eaten 
silage for 15 years, and was then a live¬ 
ly old veteran with teeth, having lost 
only the front teeth in the upper jaw, 
an accident in youth! It is an old say¬ 
ing that where there is so much smoke 
there must be some fire, and I know that 
poor, improperly grown and stored si¬ 
lage will flavor milk. So will any food 
with a pungent odor. It is to obviate 
this trouble that our experience proflt- 
eth, and the sour odorous stuff is as un¬ 
necessary as rotten or decomposing hay 
and grain. I have observed many times 
the effect in a locality of such a silo. 
The whole neighborhood would condemn 
the system from a single unfortunate 
experience. 
These criticisms and experiences come 
from the northern latitudes, where a 
large variety of corn is not easily grown 
and matured. The questioner is above 
44 degrees, about 20 miles north of my 
home in Lewis County, and unless he 
lives very near Lake Champlain I should 
say that the seasons would not be longer 
than with us. To attempt to grow the 
large southern varieties, unless he is 
an expert, would be useless, first from 
the poorer quality of silage, and second¬ 
ly from the labor of handling water and 
indigestible crude material. The great¬ 
est amount of feeding value in the least 
tonnage should be our aim. Corn grow¬ 
ing is not a question of latitude alone. 
I have seen a line fence only divide a 
large fine grow'th, uniform throughout 
the whole acreage, well eared and ma¬ 
tured, from a field of uneven growth and 
maturity not worth one-half the for¬ 
mer. These two farmers were 500 miles 
apart in latitude in corn maturing. I 
have only to repeat what I said on page 
591; that when the corn contained too 
much water, as ours does this year, the 
quality of the silage may be improved 
by drying out some of the surplus mois¬ 
ture, not enough so that air will take 
the place of water, and thus produce 
heating and white mold, but enough s« 
that the leaves will rattle. We may have 
to give it up, however, this year, on ac¬ 
count of continuous and excessive 
rains. At present writing, it looks as 
though we should be fortunate to get 
corn into the silo wet or dry. The com 
harvester will mire on high land and 
we are forced to discontinue cutting. 
Will silage injure all milk products? 
I know from a long experience that if 
of good quality it will not only not in¬ 
jure butter and cheese, and milk for use 
in its crude form, but the butter and 
cheese will be as good or better. It Is 
saying a good deal to proclaim that 
wheat bran, cornmeal and oats, with 
clover and mixed hay, can be improved 
upon as a butter ration so far as the 
effect upon quality is considered, amd 
the same may be said of cheese. But, 
mind you, the foods above mentioned 
are not found upon every cow table, and 
when otherwise, then, in my experience, 
the silage will give to the milk that pe¬ 
culiar flavor which comes from the 
grasses in Summer. As to its effect up¬ 
on the animal, even when fed the first- 
mentioned ration, I consider it has a 
special value in keeping the system well 
lubricated and in a conaition more 
easily to assimilate dry foods. 
We have sent all of our butter for a 
number of years to one firm, and never 
a pound has been sent without silage in 
it, yet not a pound has been rejected on 
account of foods. At the same time we 
have had to use care that the quality of 
silage was good. In milk production, 
our experience is the same for New 
York shipment, no fault with silage 
milk; on the other hand, the milk was 
acknowledged as very satisfactory. The 
firm which bought has asked for the 
first privilege of securing the same 
dairies again this Winter. 
If I considered it necessary, evidence 
of a similar nature could be produced 
both from our own farm and factory ex¬ 
perience, coupled with the experience of 
practical dairymen the country over. 
There is another phase of the question, 
however, upon which my mind is some¬ 
what uncertain, viz., the effect upon con¬ 
densed milk and soft cheese, that is, 
Brie, Neufchatel, square creams, etc. It 
is not necessary to mention firm names, 
but the correspondence and personal in¬ 
terviews I have at hand. The result of 
these inquiries is against silage milk. 
I am writing no new thing when I speak 
of the position taken by the condenser- 
ies, but soft-cheese manufacturers have 
in some cases objected to it. One of the 
largest manufacturers in this country, 
and a very close personal friend, who 
would have no object in any but honest 
representation and criticism, writes me: 
“I don’t see why it should be injurious 
in cured cheese, though I am inclined 
to think that it is not the right kind of 
milk for Neufchatel, inasmuch as con- 
denseries condemn it on account of af¬ 
fecting the keeping qualities.” I know 
a private dairyman, a recognized au¬ 
thority, who has made a most perfect 
Neufchatel cheese from silage milk, sell¬ 
ing to a most fastidious New York 
trade. We have therefore this conflict¬ 
ing testimony from certain manufac¬ 
turers, from which I am able to draw 
but one conclusion. Not every farmer 
has succeeded in producing a perfect 
silage, and one bad mess injures the 
whole batch. Business men with more 
or less capital invested, together with 
the cost of the raw material, are not 
inclined to take chances, and so we find 
them arbitrary and unyielding in their 
rules, and I am inclined to respect and 
consider their judgment. I have had 
some experience as a manufacturer, and 
I know how easily he suffers loss from 
milk imperfections. 
This question has come to be a serious 
one from the institute platform. In sec¬ 
tions where silage is not permitted, ad¬ 
vice has been given from the platform 
to boycott these factories and force 
them to use it. I believe this principle 
wrong, repeating again as I have done 
before, that our teaching should be the 
methods that would produce only per¬ 
fect silage, and when this had been se¬ 
cured, there would be no trouble in 
using it as a food for all milk products. 
Yes, my friend, build a good silo, tight 
walls; if solid and unyielding the form 
will not matter; fill it with ripe corn 
in the glaze, and you will not regret 
your expense. h. e. cook. 
BRIEF DAIRY FARM NOTES. 
We are quite in favor of barley and 
peas for late sowing. They are not kill¬ 
ed down by early frosts, and they seem 
to grow well both In dry seasons and 
wet. Sow as soon as convenient after 
haying, using a sprinkling of manure 
or commercial fertilizer. We get the 
best results by thorough tillage for a 
Week or two before sowing. Harrow 
the ground from three to 10 times over 
before sowing, and the seed will grow 
all the better for the extra tillage. Las'; 
year the Pea louse destroyed the peas, 
but we are not so badly afflicted here 
with the louse as to deter us from sow¬ 
ing peas again this year, and I am ex¬ 
pecting to save them. Of course they 
may be sown earlier for early feed, but 
we use them to feed in the Fall after 
the frost would have killed the corn. 
Small use to try to cure them then, but 
for green feed we like them very much. 
We get considerable protein into the 
feed that way, too. 
In speaking of one-horse farming on 
a two-horse farm, I mean no disparage¬ 
ment to the farmer. On the contrary, 
there seems to be, in some instances at 
least, much wisdom in the idea. In 
places where land is as cheap as it is 
here, hired labor appears to be the most 
expensive item the farmer has to con¬ 
tend with. The phrase, often quoted, 
that no one can afford to pasture land 
worth $100 an acre, may be true, but 
how about soiling on land worth $19 to 
$15, with labor at $1 a day plus board, 
and milk worth 65 to 70 cents per can? 
Manifestly conditions must alter meth¬ 
ods, and the institute speaker who in¬ 
sists, as many of them do, that soiling, 
silaging and feeding purchased grain to 
balance these carbonaceous foods, is 
best for all, no matter what the cost 
and condition of land, or the wages of 
hired labor, is mistaken, if nothing 
more. 
Those thistles seemed entirely out of 
place in the oatfield when we were har¬ 
vesting, and the boys didn’t like them 
when we thrashed the oats. The fact 
is, I haven’t found a convenient place 
to raise thistles. They will grow 
though in places, and I purpose keeping 
an eye on those spots, and when we 
seed them, sow oats and peas and cut 
early with a mowing machine and han¬ 
dle with a fork. Cattle eat them well 
as soon as they are wilted, and this 
saves their seeding. By the way, oats 
and peas are proving a very good crop 
with us. We grow more of them every 
year, and less oats. The cost of har¬ 
vesting is less, and the thrashing bill 
is saved; besides, their worth for feed¬ 
ing is greater, if I am not mistaken. 
Delaware Co., N. Y. h. h. l. 
Pork-Making in Kansas. 
The majority of stock feeders, that is 
those who feed a great amount of stock, 
raise but a small proportion of the grain 
they feed, but i*aise all they can, and 
depend upon buying of those farmers 
who grow feed and grain to sell. 'The 
stock feeder expects to buy more or less 
grain each year. Corn is the main food, 
with the aid of flaxseed meal, but they 
sometimes use cotton-seed meal, which 
is becoming quite popular among feed¬ 
ers. There is no corn sold from a stock 
farm unless by mere chance there is 
more than needed. These remarks per¬ 
tain to the beef feeder almost entirely. 
The beef feeder, to be successful, aims 
to have at least head of swine per 
steer to follow his cattle to utilize the 
waste. While swine do not do well on 
cotton-seed meal alone, if a small ration 
is used they do not get enough of it to 
hurt them. A great many feeders buy 
all of their feed. They aim to feed about 
all the grain the cattle will eat each day, 
with plenty of roughage, such as good 
fodder and hay. We find that good Al¬ 
falfa hay is a great aid in producing 
beef and mutton, as it seems to be a 
good flesh-producer, and is relished by 
all stock, swine Included. Some beef 
feeders grind or crush their corn with 
good results, and labor well paid for. 
In feeding swine for the pork barrel, 
1 have found that it paid to give a 
small quantity of mill feed, such as ship 
or shorts, made into a slop, and to shell 
the corn and soak It from 24 to 36 hours 
in salt water; feed in clean troughs and 
on platforms or floors. A stone floor 
would do if It could be kept clean. ’The 
stock raiser and feeder is the one who 
keeps ahead, while the farmer who 
raises grain to sell has hard work to 
make ends meet. To feed swine for 
breeding purposes I find that they should 
not be fed heavily on corn, but have 
plenty of Alfalfa pasture, with ship slop 
and a light diet of corn. Corn is too 
heating and concentrated; does not pro¬ 
duce bone and muscle enough. Corn-fed 
-SOWS will not produce as nice, large, 
healthy litters as those fed on a lighter 
combination of food. b. s. cook. 
Wichita, Kan. 
The nearest thing to a certain Cough Cure, Is Dr 
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Whbjn you write advertisers mention Thb 
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