Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Feed Silo

I ended my post about our barn building wondering if our barn was finished.  A couple of followers gave suggestions for additions; a tractor, a windmill.
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The windmill would have been great but not relevant to the farms around here. But the suggestion did inspire the idea for a silo.  I used the other half of the box that was left from the roof.  Crimping it allowed it to be curved in a circle, well almost.  I tied string around it to help hold it round.
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The silo isn’t very big and probably wouldn't last very long if we made
a door for the children to go inside.        
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Instead I thought I could build an apparatus similar, but much smaller,
to one of Tom Sensory’s.
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A tube was threaded through the silo, one end higher than the other.  Two troughs were placed on either side of the silo and we use wood pellets for the food.
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The animals were brought out of the barn to eat at the trough.
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Soon all the feed is in trough on the low side.  How do we get back to
the other side?
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One solution tried was to scoop the food at the lower end to go up the tube. 
It didn’t work.
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Another solution tried was to switch the troughs.  That worked.
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A third way was to dump the full one back into the empty trough. 
That worked too.
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IMG_0452 A great day of playing and learning.