Bethany, Connecticut
© 2016 J. G. Coleman
Virginia creeper and poison ivy climb in tangles, competing over a weathered fence post at the corner of a quiet barnyard in the south of Connecticut. Barns in the distance flank a towering concrete stave silo, likely retired from use years ago but still faithfully standing sentinel over the farm.
Silos are undoubtedly among the visual staples of farm country, but they are quickly approaching the end of their era. These unmistakable towers rose to popularity in the late 1800s as a means of preserving nutritious livestock feed for use during colder months. By the 1920s, nearly a half-million silos dotted the dairy regions of the United States.
But the purpose of the silo was to keep feed in an air-tight environment, a task accomplished far more easily these days by simply covering bunkers or feed piles in long lengths of plastic sheeting. Indeed, modern plastics have made farm life quite a bit easier, all the while tolling the death knell for the classic silo. Most of the silos that you see these days aren’t used any longer; they’ve been empty for years, in fact. Even those increasingly rare farmers who still use their silos admit that they can’t imagine ever building any new ones once the old ones are worn out and retired. It’s quite probable that within a century, the once ubiquitous silo may all but vanish from the countryside.
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