USES AND VALUE OF ENSILAGE.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 340, 6 February 1889, Page 4

USES AND VALUE OF ENSILAGE.

I have been asked to write my recent oxpevienco of ensilage, and, having now cub into a 200- lon stack of this year's taros and oabs and tares, oats, and peas, take this opportunity of doing so. I now make all my ensilage from the arable land, because I piefor to keep grass land in pasture, and the extra weight obtainable off the arable land more than pays for the extra seed and labour. I find I can get about tho samo weight per acre tares ensilage a& I used to grow of swedo turnips, and the latter required one acre of hay in rddition to one acre of turnips to feed tho samo amount of stock a& X can now feed off the one acre of tares alone — that is, one acre tares ensilage goes as far as one acre swedo turnips and one acre meadow-gra&s hay put together. Theretore, I think one of tho great features of ensilage will prove to bo that ib will entirely supersede the growth of turnips. It is cheaper to grow than turnips, is as good and cheaper as a cleaning crop, and saves tho one acre of hay in addition. On strong land, where roots cannot be grown, of cour&e, there is no question. The average turnip crop bluoughoub the kingdom is, I believe, twoho to thirteen tons per acre ; tho average of tares would be little if any less ; those with best turnip land may grow twenty tons per acic and more, bub such land will also crow exceptional crops of bares— and ib is palpable that though such land specially favourable for turnips may grow more of them than of tares, it uill not be sufficiently greater to counterbalance the ox bra cosb of cultivation of the whole hi tho requisite acre of hay ; and, therefoie, even on best turnip hind, ensilage growing is the better business. Some people still talk of ensilage as though its advantage consists in being cheaper than hay-making, or because it can be carried on independently of weather, whereas Hie fact is, except in bad weather, there is little or no dilfeienco in cosb. Immunity Irom loss incidental to hay-mnking in bad weather certainly adds to its im2joi bance and value, but the main feature is bhab you save and sboro up all that succulence of feeding matter which in ha}' is bleached out and lost, and requires the i-oot crop or bran mashes, &c, to replace. Hence the fact that ib is found the same acreage carries moie stock when made into ensilage than when dried into hay, and with ensilage you introduce into tho farmyard a new fodder, which can do for farm stock all which hay and straw can do, bub which is also available for purposes for which hay and straw are ineffectual ; for instance, cabbie cannot properly be fed for the bubcher on hay without roots, whilst with ensilage they are not needed. Milk cows dry if fed on hay, unless supplied with brewers' grains or mashes. Ensilage has not bhab tondency. Recent experience has moie than ever impressed me with tho fact, as stated in my evidence before the Ensilage Commission in 1885, viz., bhab for farm purposes "it is wasteful to mako hay, even in the finest of weather." Although silos may now be said to be superseded by stacks, on account of the less firsb cost of stack presses, and their elasticity as to quantity — yet there is still an impression amongst some thab bhere is loss waste in a silo. Thi? is nob so. 1 have tried both thoroughly, and find there is more waste in a silo. If sweeb ensilage be attempted in a silo it is so uncertain thab the bulk may come sweeb Still there will be some burnt black, and more or less spoilt, some sour, and a great deal after being opened will go mouldy where the intervals in filling took place to allow heat to ri&e. Or, if content with sour silage (strongsmelling milk tasting thereof), waste takes place through the valuable ingiedients being consumed by the process being allowed bo go on bo the higher form of acids at their expense — which decomposition is prevented if tho fodder has been, as it were, boiled up to a temperature of 122 degree?, at which preservation takes place, and the ensilage remains sweet, whereas in stacks tho whole bugbear, outside waste, Is practically not an imporlanb matter on properly pressed stacks. Tho six or eight tons of loose, mouldy stuffs should never exceed 3 per cent, of the whole — say, difference between its value as ensilage £1, and it*> value as manure 4s, three tons at 16s is 483 on a 100- ton stack. The stack I have recently cub into is beautifully sweet bolder. ng on sour, and yet not so ; juslwhab I consider we should aim at, of gieenish-yellow colour, good to within l^in. of tho top, and tho vtholo waste— top, bottom, and _sides— is estimated afc not moie than about one ton for the 200 ton stack, per cent., and the upper and lower portions of bho stacks aro practically of uniform colour and quality. I consider bhe process is a most simple one, is certain, and quite easy to carry out when understood ; bub without proper appliances and requisite knowledge it is most easy to do wrong. Tho thing which surprises me is thab people urn after clean makeshifts, which are deficient in bhe very fundamental principle—viz., pressure -and then expect to conjure a success, instead of, as in every other use of machinery, seeking out bho very besb obtainable. When farmers get to know the real value of good ensilage, and tho wide difference there is tetween good and imperfectly made ensilage, and can realise the beautiful simplicity of a stack, practically with no waste, then we shall hear less of the pressureless makeshift^ and see what wo ought bo see, moio ensilage stacks in a day's journey than hay stacks. According to my experience the crop mubt be cub fully succulent (and yet nob too young, as before explained), if tares and oats just when grained, but before any yellow is perceptible on the oats— must be carried as cub. Well trodden -in stacks, pressed with at least 2501b per square foot really ; and, therefore, must be readily applied every night, and the pressure never relaxed unbil cub for use, however long deferred thab time may be. The result will then be sweet ensilage of a greenish yellow colour bordering on, and yob just nob sour, and practically of uniform quality and colour in upper and lower portion of stacks ; if dark brown or black, it is spoiled through | being overheated, due entirely bo_ want of pressure, being too ripe, or lefb lying after being cut. This, so far as I know, correctly applies bo all ci*ops oxcepb aftermath of meadow grdss. which comes out soui', even when made in a stack. As to cubbing during rain, my experience is bhab stacking may be continued however much rain may be falling, as when tho pressure is put on ib all squeezes oub. I have seen it run like a trout stream (discoloured water) Avhen being pressed after a web day's stacking, and yob that ensilage, when cub into, jusb bho same as other parts above and below which had no rain. Ib has frequently been discussed whether, in bhe evenb of a crop getbing too ripe and dry, good would result from pouring water on the stack. I was for some bime in doubt on bhis point bub result of observabion is bhat ib makes no pvecepbible difference ; added water like rain would simply squeeze oub and leave no result. The main thing is to cut at right bime, carry as cub without lebbing the crop get exposed to sun and wind ;

for this reason always promptly rake up Inbo winnow, for this purpose the American horse rake answers well. Treading the stacks with cheap labour, such as boys and women, makefi a great difference, saves excessive forking through the stack not running up to such a great height, and oven if an elevator be used it should be done, as it keeps the stack solid and so prevents heating during the day, and saves annoyance through the stacks heeling ovor until the press gets on at night and makes all secure. As to foeding with ensilage, people ask what should it be used for, with what admixtuie of hay or straw, or roots, and how many pounds por day. The reply i- 5 , for overy kind of stock including farm horses of all ages — by itself without being diluted witli any such food as hay, straw, or roots — and as to quantity as much as they can eat —which in full-sized horned stock U from 701b to 801b per day. My farm -horses never get covn so long as they are on all ensilage, but if they havetobe put on hay there i 3 an outcry for corn at once. Lambing ewes make a very marked improvement in their milk when put on ensilage. This spring my forty ewes were brought up to lamb ; twenty had access to an ensilage stack helped themselves freely, and proved such superior mothers that my man came to know if he might carry some to tho others, Avhich had only hay, and were milking badly. He did so, they improved at once. This last spring, when ensilage was done, the fattening bullocks and heifers were supplied with meadow grass and autumn - sown tares, and afterwards wibh spring - sown tares cut and carried to them ; the butcher, who was taking them by weight as they came ready, declared they did not go on so fast as they had been doing on taies ensilage. This, we observed, was the case all through the summer. The butcher announced himself a convert from that time forth. People at one time imagined all sorts of evils might arise if ensilage was served alone to cattle. This is not so. I have now used it for some four or five years or so, and also as admixture with hay andstraw, and invaribly found the change from all ensilage to part ensilage, and part hay or straw, was a step in the wrong direction, and of course die better the crop tho better the result. A wellgrown first crop seeds and clover makes most valuable feeding ensilage, though nothing that I have tried beats tares and oats, or tares, oats, and peas grown together, and I grow them year after year on the same land, but of course manured freely after each crop. Too much attention cannot be given to the fact that &econd crop (aftermath) of seeds and clover makes particularly good ensilage, is particularly easy to make good, whilst everyone knows is generally (almost always in the north) very inferioras hay, or if grazed is mostly trampled down and wasted, and in its raw state does not always do cattle much good. Milk cows are fed on ensilage per se with the best results, providing that it be sweet, and the milk and cx-eam is then never tainted, but with some, such as made in closed silos, the milk is invariably more or leas tainted, unless the amount of ensilage used along with other food is reduced to a homoeopathic allowance. Bad ensilage which is burnt black through overheating has a tendency to constipation and stoppage of the bowels, but good keeps them in perfect order — far superior in this, as in other respects, to the scouring effect produced by turnips, now doomed ere long to become the subject only of history. — C. U. Joiixson, Cioffc, Darlington, ia Agricultural Gazette.