256 IOWA DEPARTMENT OP AGRICULTURE. 



boomer if he sells honestly and announces his prices nonestly. Let us 

 have more of him and of the men who can pay high prices and go home 

 with their purchases and take care of them as they deserve, multiply 

 their kind and make them pay out. Always we need the high seller to 

 set a mark of excellence in achievement and prove that it pays to excel 

 but he should win by honest effort and methods and announce his suc- 

 cesses rather by the merit of his contributions to the breed than by his 

 advertising to create an unhealthy demand for stock by spurious argu- 

 ment or promise. 



The boomer makes a hollow sound when he is buying and selling, 

 roars when he is measured by good judgment, and you hear his cry when 

 he is called to make good his representations or his notes. His business 

 is sure to relapse and all who mingle with him are besmirched. 



Mr. Benson seemed to cover his subject so thoronoflily that no 

 one was inclined to take it np further and J. R. Harding of 

 Macedonia, Iowa, gave his methods of Care and Treatment of a 

 Crop of Pigs for the Greatest Profit. 



CARE AND TREATMENT OF A CROP OF PIGS FOR THE GREATEST 



PROFIT. 



J. K. HARDIXG, MACEDONIA, IOWA. 



I was asked to write a paper on care and treating of a crop of pigs 

 for the greatest profit. As I am a breeder of pure bred hogs I suppose 

 that the intention was to treat on that class of swine, but I shall give 

 my experience both in feeding for pork and for the development of 

 breeding stock. 



My method in detail is this: The first thing is to select the sows that 

 are to be used in producing the crop of pigs. Great care should be taken 

 to select sows that show vigorous constitutions; sows that are a strong 

 type of the breed we are engaged in raising. I prefer a lengthy, deep 

 bodied sow, with a head not too broad, one which might be termed slim, 

 as they prove better mothers than those with broad masculine heads. 

 Then mate these sows to males that are especially ss;rong where these 

 sows might be weak. The practice of breeding one male to the entire herd 

 of sows regardless of their fitness is too common among the average 

 swine raisers for the general market, and there is a great loss in the 

 future development of the crop of pigs as the direct result of this mis- 

 mating of sire and dam. I find there is a great difference in the de- 

 velopment of young pigs if the dam is fed on bone and muscle making 

 foods instead of fat reducing food. I consider that if a sow is fed right 

 during the period from breeding until farrowing time, it means one-fourth 

 in the future development, as pigs from sows fed as I have stated are 

 stronger and will grow faster and have more vitality than the pigs 

 from equally as good a sire and dam on an exclusive corn diet. 



At farrowing time, great care should be taken to provide dry, clean 

 saparate quarters for each sow and if the weather is cold the bedding 



