coonie minnie

Well-known Member
There have been numerous posts lately about silos and the history of silage, etc.
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If the image comes through, this is a picture of an early square silo near me. In our neighborhood were around a dozen square silos such as this, with many still in existence. As I mentioned in a previous post, two of Wisconsin's first documented silos were built within a few miles of this one. Most were like this one- stone construction, square, often with twin silos side by side. In some cases, the original silo was rectangular, and a wall was built in the center later on so that the "face" of the exposed silage was smaller and didn't spoil so much.

Several of the ones in my neighborhood were like this one in the fact that they were added on to at some point with a poured concrete top addition. This has sort of assured their survival, as no one wants to knock them down, as they fear the stone wall crumbling and the large concrete chunk coming down in one piece and killing someone. The height added significant capacity, as the feed would pack more, and silage is a lot more dense at the bottom of a tall silo. This also reduced spoilage.

All of them that I know of were originally covered in wood, and either part of a barn or attached to one. This one was next to a barn that fell into disrepair in the 1980's. The barn collapsed perhaps 10 years ago, and the foundation bulldozed recently. All that remains is this "monument".

A few of these in the neighborhood were filled into the early 70's.

I hope some of you find this interesting...
 
It is interesting to me. Ive never seen a rectangular silo before. The 70s don't seem like it was that long ago but it is a life time to some. Things sure have change on the farm in 50 years.
 
Tony, have you been on SD 25 going north out of DeSmet recently? There used to be an old concrete silo there that was leaning severely. It was on the west side of the road on the north edge of town. Before I retired, I traveled that road a lot & always wondered when it was going to fall. Looked like it was built in the teens. I wonder if it's still standing.
 
They were pitched out... but there is one across the street from my house with a pit deep enough they used an elevator to get the feed up to the level the cows were on.

The ones that had a center wall put in later require pitching the feed twice for some of it. There was not a good way to make another set of holes in a stone wall once built, so the the doors for the second silo were built into the center wall. You pitched the first silo empty, the started the second one, having to throw the feed into the first silo, then out to the feed room.

Round silos came along long before the silo unloader... the corners in a square silo never packed well, and were often moldy. There are round stone silos in the neighborhood, as well as tile ones, concrete block ones, wood stave, and of course concrete stave and poured concrete.
 
very interesting. I have never seen a silo like that, though there is a barn near me that has 2 square silos built into it, all under the same roof as the barn. I would never have guessed that your picture was a silo.
 
(quoted from post at 18:39:30 09/21/20) Tony, have you been on SD 25 going north out of DeSmet recently? There used to be an old concrete silo there that was leaning severely. It was on the west side of the road on the north edge of town. Before I retired, I traveled that road a lot & always wondered when it was going to fall. Looked like it was built in the teens. I wonder if it's still standing.
al, I was by there prolly a year ago it was still leaning. I might be going by there this weekend will have to look.
 
The old farm site has a small concrete stave silo, 14 by 25 I think. I pitched that empty a couple times . After my brother took over he put in unloader and it still lays on the bottom in the 5 ft pit. It was hanging part way up inside but I let it down to the bottom. At the auction, ( I had to sell all my brothers things) some one bought the unloader but never did come and take it out so there it lays with trees growing up in with it.

When I was a bit younger I was the man inside during filling. My dad had to have that silage evenly distributed to minimize spoilage and freezing to sides. Got up to the top one time when filling and now body would look up. No where for me to go, couldn't get anyone's attention, so I let her plug the pipe. That got their attention.
 
So what would be the approximate dimensions of that silo? It is difficult to guess from the photo. It appears, though, that it would be quite a task forking ensilage from the back corners to the front doors! Perhaps they needed a wheelbarrow up in the silo. Certainly dates back to when men were men and little boys were half a man!!
 
There are a few of these stone silos remaining in this area. Just happened to take pictures of this place a few days ago.
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Thats why you have kids, to throw down silage before school. I know this is true cause when us kids grew up that is what we did. When we left Dad bought a silage unloader and a skid loader and a bunk with a delivery chain. LOL
 
That is beautiful. Depending on condition, install an internal steel support system then build a bed and breakfast. If it is close to any tourist spots it would be a hit.
 

Found the leaning silo north of DeSmet SD on google maps and was going to post a screen shot but noticed the google data date was Sept of 2009. Didn't figure an 11 year old picture would answer the question. Darn it.
 
I have a picture some where in an old farm magazine of how they were emptying an old bunker silo. They had a conveyor running across the silo on the floor by the wall of silage and inclined up and out the side of the bunker. They had 6-8 men with forks pitching the silage from the wall of silage down into the conveyor. Arm strong and modern working together to get the job done. I would hate to pitch out that square silo. Sometimes when filling my 20' x 60' stave silo between days I would pitch some silage out the door to feed the cows. When I came down the silo tired the cows had already eaten 90+% of what I threw down; and that was by the door and NOT 20' across the silo!
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