96 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Fes., 1898. 
This being true, if the cow is being milked at the time these products are 
circulating in the blood, a portion of them will be removed in the milk, and 
will impart a flavour or odour to it. On the other hand, if sufficient time 
intervenes between feeding and milking, then such products will haye been 
removed from the blood by the skin, lungs, and kidneys; the milk is drawn 
without the odour, or with its intensity greatly reduced. The dairyman then 
has it in his power to strengthen or to weaken certain flavours or odours in his 
milk and butter by both the kind and the time of feeding. A. higher score 
was given by Chicago experts to silage butter in point of flavour. 
Professor King, in conjunction with Professor E. H. Farrington, 
Instructor in Dairy Husbandry at the Wisconsin University Experiment 
Station, conducted a series of experiments to prove whether silage odours in 
the air about the milk will impart a perceptible flavour or acidity to it. 
- The milk was placed where the strongest effects could be obtained. Thus 
a quantity of sweet milk from the creamery having the temperature of the air 
was divided into two lots, and one portion placed in an open milk-pail setting 
inside one a little larger, and then placed inside the silo, where it was allowed 
to set upon the silage for one hour. ‘This milk was then placed in a series of 
numbered cans, with others like them containing the same kind of milk which 
had not been in the silo. These milks, 120 in number, were then examined 
and classified by persons familiar with the sweetish odour given to milk by 
silage, with the result that, out of 120 judgments by experienced judges when 
silage odour was definitely to be sought for, there were thirteen incorrect 
judgments. 
To make the test still more decisive, two lots of the same milk were taken 
to the silo, and one was placed under the conditions described ; the other had 
the air from the silo driven into and through the milk during one hour, and 
then both were placed in cans and submitted to the expert observers to be 
classified as having or not having the sweetish smell in question. In seven 
cases out of twenty-four there was a mistaken judgment, and it was agreed that 
the odours taken up by these milks were much less pronounced than is found 
in milks produced where silage is fed just before milking. 
To ascertain if the silage odours could have an effect on the acidity of the 
milk, a quantity of sweet milk was divided into two lots, and one portion 
placed in a 2-gallon bottle and taken to the silo where, with a small hand- 
bellows, the amount of air it would hold was forced through the milk 1,000 times. 
The milk and its reserved portion were then tested ay to their acidity; and to 
the surprise of the observers the milk aerated in the silo indicated the least 
acidity. Thus it is shown that silage air does not measurably increase the 
acidity of milk. It also appears that silage odours enter milk more rapidly 
through the cow than from the air. 
The best corn silage and the smallest necessary loss occur when the silage 
is made from well-matured, well-eared corn. Such corn, with leaves still green, 
is in the proper stage for the silo. 
The silo should be filled slowly, the time extending over fifteen days, giving 
time for the silage to settle and to expel the entangled air, by setting free 
carbonic acid, cl thus ensuring small losses and sweet silage. 
The smaller varieties of corn are the best for silage. 
Corn may be put in the silo either whole or cut, but more care and time 
are required with whole corn than if it is run through the cutter first; and it 
is certain that more time will be required to take the’ silage out of the silo if 
put in whole. 
As methods of farming become more and more intensive, farmers will 
come to use silage as a part ration during the whole year. The silo must 
ultimately supplant the pasture, except as a place for airing and exercise, and 
no method of soiling can prove as economical as the silo when properly 
constructed and handled.—Bulletin of the Agricultural Experiment Harm, 
Wisconsin University, U.S. 
