The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1900-09-19
Shredded Corn.-lts Value.
From the Southern Cultivator.

From the Southern Cultivator.
The Georgia Experiment Station
places the value of constalks IN
Georgia at about one and half mil
lion (l,5OO,OOW dollars per year. At
least 95 per cent, of this is wasted by
being left in the field to rot, without
materially bene6ting the soil as
fertilizer, yet very much in the way
while cultivating the crop the follow
ing wear. While this waste is going
on the poor mans stock is left almost
to perish upon dead grass during the
winter months and the wealthy mans
cattle feed upon cotton seed bulls
and meal, sometimes to eat timothy
hay, raised, cured, baled and shipped
from some other State, the same
costing from SIS to $40 per ton.
Last September I bought an inter-
est in Shredder, cut, shocked and
shredded eighteen acres OF corn, haV-
ing sufficient to winter sixteen COWS
and two.mules, using no other forage
besides having to feed COWS through
an unusually long winter. I winter
ed four other cows (not my OWN upon
cotton seed bulls and meal at cost
of from 50 to 50 so per month.
Comparing cost on the above;
half dozen hands can cut and shock
eighteen acres of corn in day. Six
hands could with difficulty pull fod-
der from about one-tbird as much
ground. and fodder curing is gen
orally accompanied with great deal
of risk. The corn, if we'll shocked,
will not injure if rained upon for two
weeks, for it should be shocked as
fast as cut.
From The Cultivator I see that
hoes are used to cut the corn. My
plan is to break the hook from an old
sc5the blade, batter down the hook
end and bind with padding for
handle. This will be found to have
the right length and weight and
serves the purpose much better than
hoe, as the corn may in this matter
be laid in straight piles, and gathered
easily for shocking. A careful hand
should start the shock by placing
two armiuls of the cut corn together
with the butts placed firmly on the
ground and the tops placed well
together. The shock thus started
resemble the letter A. Afterward
the other hands may gether up the
corn lying near and place equally on
al sides.
In bottom or very big corn, a ladder
of three or four risers may be usedin
order to reach the top to tie securely.
In four to six weeks shocks with
two to three hundred stalks in them
will be ready for the shredder. In
case the shreiding cannot be done at
the expiration of the curing period
three or four shocks at small cost
may be combined, and then the
shredding may be postponed indch
nitely. This corn will not iriure if
the tops are we'll pressed together
and the shock shaped to shed the
rain.
Be sure the corn is we'll cured be
fore shredding, and use a good
shredder. With 8 machlne, run ny
a six-horse power engine, I shredded
from two to three tons per hour at
the small cost of IS cents per ton,
including hauling.
Try shredded corn one year and
you will continue shredding. l
doubted the expediency (others will)
at first but was convinced that shred
ding is more profitable. The same
amount of corn is heavier than corn
harvested in the usual way from
which the fodder has been pulled.
Cattle will fare better upon it and
fatten faster than when fed upon
meal and hulls.