AN ENSILAGE – PRESSING DEVICE.

New Zealand Journal of Agriculture, Volume XIII, Issue 4, 20 October 1916, Page 287

AN ENSILAGE - PRESSING DEVICE.

The usual method of pressing ensilage material when stackedby weighting the stack with earth, &c.—involves heavy lifting, and has other drawbacks. An alternative , method of pressing the stack by means of strained wires, while not a new device, appears to be very little known in New Zealand. As illustrated in “ Stephens’s Book of the Farm,” this method requires the use of manufactured metal apparatus. Particulars of a simple and effective pressing-device on the same principle, but for • which all the necessary material is available on most farms, are supplied by Mr. C. T. Middleton, of Sumner, near Christchurch, who states that he adopted the device in Australia many years ago (as an original idea), and intends to use it on his farm this season. The following details, read in conjunction with the sketches on the next page, should enable any farmer to readily carry out the method described:—

When preparing the site for the stack place sets of two fairly stout poles, 8 ft. long, every 4 ft. or 6 ft. on either side of the bottom, leaving 18 in. space between the poles forming each set. 6 ft. of the poles should be under the stack and each set opposite the other on the two sides. This will leave 2 ft. of the poles projecting. Under each set and in line with the side of the stack put a stout chock of wood, which will raise the projecting ends of the poles from the ground. Next take a “ Spanish windlass ” for each set of poles. This can be easily made by sawing off proper lengths of any round hardwood, such as the branches of gum-trees, and making the necessary holes with a brace and bit (the apparatus being on the same lines as a roller for straining wire on fences). As soon as the stack is built and properly topped place poles along the top; then, having the windlasses in position under each set of ground poles, connect each pair with stout fencing-wire and strain away. The poles on top serve the purpose of giving an even pressure over the stack, and at the same time prevent the wire from cutting into the ensilage material. A very heavy even pressure is thus obtained, and it is a very simple matter to give the windlasses a turn every now and again until the stack becames a solid mass. A covering of straw or similar material will then exclude rain.”

It is not claimed for this device that it would necessarily take the place of the ordinary method of pressing under all conditions and for every sort of ensilage. The many different points of ensilagemaking, as regards ciass of material, curing-temperatures, &c., should, of course, be taken into consideration in each case.