SEVENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK-PART X. 629 



SWINE RAISING AND FEEDING WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO 

 THE USE OF CLOVER AND OTHER FOODS THAN CORN. 



J. W. Forney, Winterset, Iowa, Before Madison County Farmers' In- 

 stitute. 



Some men say a clover field is of little value for a hog pasture; 

 others say an acre of clover is worth as much as the corn that will 

 grow on an equal amount of land. I say a man who will not provide 

 a clover field for his hogs had better quit the hog business and in- 

 terest himself in producing grain and selling it to his neighbor who 

 does. 



Every acre of clover is worth as much as corn from two acres. 



To produce pork at the least possible expense, a man's greatest need 

 (after he has gone to the necessary expense of wintering a number of 

 brood sows or stock hogs) is a bluegrass pasture. This will furnish 

 the necessary green food your hogs are so much in need of till your 

 clover can be used. A rye pasture early in the spring is also excellent 

 for hogs of all ages. 



There can be quite a saving in the amount of corn fed after the 

 hogs have access to these pastures. When the clover field is ready 

 for pasturage, the ground which was in rye can be plowed and planted 

 to corn or other crops, or left to mature a crop of rye. So you are 

 not put to any expense for rye pasture, except about fifty cents per 

 acre for your seed. 



To get the best results from efforts to produce pork from clover 

 and grasses, you will need a bunch of healthy hogs of good grade and 

 a good clover field. The hog, being a subject of itself, I shall proceed 

 at once to the care of the clover field. If you»have your field poorly seeded, 

 you will not get more than half the feed from it that you would if 

 you have it properly seeded. If you neglect your clover at the right 

 time, you will get only three months' pasture when you could have had 

 six. The last clover field I allowed my hogs to "hog down" was "all in" 

 by the fifteenth of July. There was not enough pasture on that field 

 to supply two hogs per acre after that time. 



If you allow your clover to mature and be trampled down by a lot 

 of hogs that are trying to get the last blossom, it will smother and die 

 in the early part of July and you simply have a lot of dead clover 

 stems lying on the ground for a hog pasture. 



Do not allow your hogs to have the run of a large clover field, when 

 you only have hogs enough for a small portion of it. Fence off what 

 you need for a pasture and leave the rest for hay. One acre of well 

 seeded clover is sufficient for ten or twelve hogs wighing from one to 

 two hundred pounds. 



