82 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



judgment, make a good fattening hog and bring a large litter of 

 pigs. That was my idea. To get a hog that would fatten easily 

 and breed a large litter of pigs. I want to say here that in going 

 out of Poland-Chinas into Duroc-Jerseys I covered a period of seven 

 years; and I learned the following to be a fact, although you may 

 contradict it. I have said already that I like the Poland-China 

 hog. I say this now, that in passing from one breed to another, 

 holding to the Poland-Chinas until I could get a sufficient number 

 of Durocs, I learned that 15 Duroc- Jersey sows will just about 

 equal in prolificness 20 Poland-Chinas. I am building up one herd 

 with another, and my object is to get hogs at the lowest possible 

 expense, and the difference in keeping 20 brood sows and 15 is the 

 difference in the two breeds. 



Now, as to how I selected brood sows this year. It is pretty 

 hard to get alfalfa hogs not too fat. Alfalfa gives them bone and 

 muscle. I have about 100 head of spring pigs. They are allowed 

 to run in the alfalfa with about % of a pound of corn per day. 

 Now, they were fed that way until the new corn crop came in, and 

 all ran together until this period. Then they were in such good 

 order that I could easily determine by looking over the herd the 

 sows that were going to take on fat most easily, and that is the 

 end of hog raising. Get her fat and put her on the market. All 

 I did in selecting what I wanted was to go among my hogs and 

 pick out those that I thought were going to fatten the best. Some 

 will say you will soon get your hogs so they will become chunky. 

 I recognize that. I govern this solely by the sire. I think it very 

 important, if you have plenty of alfalfa, that you have at least 

 100 hogs and spring pigs to turn on it. 



Now, I come to the next question, how shall we handle hogs 

 until weaning time ? All of you who don't raise alfalfa feed shorts 

 and bran, don't you? Well, that's all right. I used to do it, but 

 I don't now. Until they are three weeks old they get alfalfa 

 through the mother, and at that age they can begin to eat it them- 

 selves. They grow rapidly and then I teach them as best I can to 

 eat corn. I shell the corn. A pig will eat shelled corn about as 

 early as anything else you can give it. It will eat shelled corn 

 quicker than slop. I want to say right here that I have never 

 seen the time when I was afraid of my hogs eating too much corn 

 when they had access to alfalfa. You know you are afraid pigs 

 will eat too much corn and get chunky ; but they don't do this when 

 you feed them alfalfa too. You need not be afraid as long as you 

 let them run on alfalfa. When the mothers are fed alfalfa, their 



