540 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Mr. Hadley: I never tried corn meal with it; but I think I would like 

 the shorts best, though. 



The President: Mr. Gurler, do you feed some, too? 



Mr. Gurler: Yes, sir. We feed our skim milk exclusively to our hogs, 

 excepting what goes to the calves. I keep no calves that are not flrst- 

 class. We have a good deal of milk, and we only keep hogs enough to con- 

 sume our milk with very little corn or anything else. It was a question 

 of economy that prompted us to do so, and the result was very excellent, 

 and we have pursued it; and for breeding purposes, I have been feeding 

 nothing but skim milk. We take a sow and put her in a pen some little 

 time before she litters, and keep her there until the pigs are ready to 

 wean. We do not keep more hogs than enough to consume the milk. 

 When the pigs are weaned, we take the mother away and feed them 

 nothing but milk until they are six or seven months old. Then they go 

 to the stock yards, or go to some person for breeding purposes. They 

 usually run from about 175 to 200 pounds in weight, and we alwajis get 

 top prices for\them when we take them to the stockyards. We have sold 

 a good many of them for breeding purposes. I think from what I have 

 seen in the papers recently that it is coming to the point where slfim milk 

 furnishes nearly all the necessary ingredients for growing pigs. It has 

 been the experience with us, at least. It is only when we want to finish 

 them for our own use or have an abundance of corn that we feed them 

 any corn at all. In other words, the feeding of skim milk, feeding it im- 

 mediately from the separator in abundance, about as much as they want, 

 we find is profitable when judged by the money we get from the sale of 

 the hogs. We know about the amount of hogs we sell, we know how many 

 pounds of milk we get in a year, and we know about what we have fed 

 our hog^ We think it is about the most profitable thing we do. 



Mr. Gurler: Did, you ever make any estimate of the value of this 

 skim milk, the cash value? 



Mr. Woods: We are not feeding any at the present time, but we did 

 at one time feed a great deal of skim milk. We always thought it paid 

 better to have more pigs and not feed exclusively skim milk, but feed corn 

 with it. With the present price of corn and pork, it would be more profit- 

 able buying the corn at those figures and mix and feed it. I find that 

 pigs will do better on skim milk and corn than they will on corn alone or 

 skim milk alone. 



The Secretary: What food balancos up the skim milk best? 



Mr. Woods: Corn. 



The Socretai-y: Why? 



