18 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



swine breeding and feeding, such should let it alone, for to succeed in the 

 handling of any kind of farm stock, one must like the animals and the work. 

 You often hear the remark "As dirty as a pig." This is a villification of the 

 animal which Beniamin Franklin's colored servant said "Was the only gen- 

 tlemen in England," from the fact that he was the only animal that did not 

 have to work in that country. It is a well known fact that in most respects, 

 the hog is the most cleanly of our domestic animals, and unless closely con- 

 fined in small quarters will always keep himself and his bed clean. In this 

 respect he is much cleaner than the horse or cow. 



' 'It has been said that the hog is a machine that oils himself, puts ten 

 bushels of feed into less space than a bushel measure and in so doing 

 doubles its value, then can carry it to market on his back. Corn, barley, 

 oats, grass, rape, clover or any of the by-products of these loaned to a well- 

 bred, thrifty hog, is money at big interest. In fact, it is a mint, the grains 

 and grasses are the bullion, which put into the hog is transmuted into coin. 

 It is an honest mint, and gives sixteen ounces avoirdupois of edible meat. 

 Properly bred, fed and intelligently handled this autocratic porker will pay 

 off our debts , furnish the money to improve the farm , place a piano in the 

 home, a carriage at the door, as well as means to educate our boys at the 

 Agricultural College. 



He furnished the means for us at home on the farm to build in 1902 a 

 general farm barn that complete cost a little over $5,000. The breeding of 

 swine with us is a specialty, and during 1902 the sales of hogs alone from 

 our 300-acre farm on which your speaker lives, was "$10,260, not bought and 

 sold, but with the exception of four or five were all grown on the farm dur- 

 ing the year. I also read a few days since a detailed statement in an agri- 

 cultural journal of an Iowa farmer, who stated that the sales from an 

 eighty-acre farm which, if I remember right, was a little over $2,000 for the 

 year; nearly all was from the sale of hogs for market purposes. There was 

 scarcely a month in the year that this man did not sell more or less hogs to 

 be shipped to market, and the hogs were by far the most profitable produce 

 of the farm So much for hogs in general." 



THK BEST HOG TO RAISE. 



"Now, I suppose many of you think I am going to name some particular 

 breed, or that I have an 'ax to grind;' far from it. The best hog to raise 

 is the one that best suits your fancy, or that you think is best adapt d to 

 your surroundings. There are many good breeds, all very similar, and any 

 of them will pay you well if properly cared for; and also, any of them will 

 die of the cholera or swine plague if the germ gets into the herd, sure cures 

 to the contrary notwithstanding. This matter of swine disease, while a 

 great drawback to the business, is something that no man has yet mastered. 

 There are all kinds of beliefs regarding this disease as well as cures. From an 

 experience of nearly thirty years as a swine breeder, I must admit I know 

 as little about it now as I did in the beginning; one thing that I do know is, 

 that no matter in how good a condition the animals may be or how few are 

 kept together, or what the feed may be, or the weather, if the germ once 

 gets into the herd they are practically a goner. I personally know of cases 

 where nearly the entire herd has been lost and the hogs were in perfect 

 health and condition, not over six or eight in a place, the lots being good 



