124 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AORICULTUKE 



Q. At what weights do you expect to put them on the market ? 



Mr. Gunn : Those that come in the fall I figure will Aveigh about 

 225 to 250 ; the latter is the limit. I do not think it profitable to 

 keep a hog after it weighs 250. 



Q. Do you recommend raising two litters a year or only one, 

 and do you recommend keeping the old sows over or marketing 

 them ? 



Mr. Gunn : ]\ry experience with the old sows has not been very 

 good. If you grow a young sow that way and give her a good 

 frame, she is more lively than an old one. I have kept good old 

 sows that had raised two litters the first year, and they were regu- 

 lar old sluggards; they would lie doAATi on a pig and let it squeal 

 under them until it was dead. I have better luck with young sows. 



President Sykes : About how many pigs do you figure on raising 

 each year? 



Mr. Gunn : We raise all we can. We usually aim to have 

 about 100 to 125 sows, and we raise all the way from 600 to 900. 

 I have raised 1,000, but we don't figure on that many all the time. 



Q. What is your objection to having them lay on the cement 

 floor 1 



]Mr. Gunn: I don't object to that if it is well bedded; but 

 what I object to is the hog-house with the plank floor about a foot 

 from the ground; the winter winds blow right under it and the 

 hogs pile up. 



Q. Did you ever try a dirt floor with woven wire? Don't you 

 consider that the ideal floor? 



Mr. Gunn : That is an ideal floor. 



Q. How do you keep the strong pigs from robbing the weaker 

 ones? 



Mr. Gunn: You have that problem to contend with all the 

 time. The only way to break that up is to feed the sow enough 

 so that she has ^11 the milk they want, and then they won't bother 

 the others. I keep the pigs with their own mother for about ten 

 days. You should not keep them much longer than that, because 

 the pigs will be too fat if the sow is heavily on feed. If I were 

 doing it myself on a smaller scale, I would probably do many 

 things different, but in order to use hired help you have to have a 

 machine system. 



