ESSAYS 671 



merits, 1 but the maintenance requirements of fully grown pigs have not been 

 exactly determined. As regards the quality of the food required, pigs compare 

 unfavourably with ruminants. 



The digestive powers of pigs are inferior to those of ruminants, and no evidence 

 is forthcoming to show that pigs retain, either as growth increase or as fattening 

 increase, larger amounts of the digested nutrients given in excess of maintenance 

 requirements. 



Warrington has also declared that, "as a natural result of the larger con- 

 sumption of food, the pig increases in weight much more speedily than either the 

 sheep or ox." This, however, is contrary to the fact. If a pig of 100 lb. and a 

 calf of the same live weight be fed for a year the latter will be the heavier at the 

 end of that time. This comparison is perhaps unsound. To compare the amount 

 of increase made by a young growing pig with that of an ox that is already fully 

 grown, or nearly so, is absurd. 



There is some reason to believe that young pigs produce true fattening 

 increase more rapidly than cattle or sheep. It remains to be seen whether they 

 fatten more rapidly than calves or lambs of the same or corresponding age. 

 With regard to the rate of fattening of fully grown pigs — e.g. old sows — data are 

 lacking. 



These considerations afford grounds for scepticism as to the alleged superiority 

 of the pig as a converter of fodder into meat, and much careful research will be 

 required before the question can be finally determined. Available data bearing 

 on questions of meat production in general are incomplete and unreliable, and it 

 is difficult to place much confidence in some of the inferences which have been 

 drawn. 



A committee on Food Supply, appointed by the Royal Society at the request 

 of the President of the Board of Trade, has recently issued a Report 2 in which 

 it is stated that " considerable economy of fodder can be effected by varying the 

 kind of animal to which it is fed. All animals are not equally good ' converters,' 

 as is shown by the following figures : starch equivalent required to produce 

 1,000 calories in the form of — pig meat, yo ; baby beef, yo; steer beef, 9/0." 

 The committee also recommends that cattle should be slaughtered at the age 

 of seventeen months. 



No notice is taken of the " inferior quality " 3 of baby beef. In time of war, no 

 doubt, that is a matter of minor importance ; but if calories for starch equivalent 

 be accepted as the sole criterion of economy of fodder the committee might have 

 gone further. It seems clear that the greatest economy, in the sense referred 

 to, will be attained by slaughtering the animals unfattened — i.e. in the "par" 

 condition, at or about the point of maximum daily growth. This point does not 

 seem to have been exactly determined, but, in the case of cattle, it will probably 

 be found in the neighbourhood of from nine to twelve months — at all events 

 earlier than the age recommended. The general effect of all the points made by 

 the committee in this connection is to magnify the importance of growth increase 

 as compared with that due to fattening. Hitherto, practically all recorded 

 experiments which have attempted to distinguish between the two have dealt 

 exclusively with the latter. Few, if any, experiments on growth increase have 

 been described, and exact information on this subject is lacking. Even what is 

 covered by the term is still uncertain. 



1 Bull. 28, Missouri Agric. Coll. 



* Journal of the Board of Agriculture, vol. xxiii. No. 11, p. 1046. 



3 Standard Cyclopa;dia of Agriculture. 



