554 Feeds and Feeding. 



The table shows that the pigs averaged 2.5 pounds in weight 

 when farrowed. When these pigs were one week old they weighed 

 on the average 4.4 pounds each a gain of 76 per cent, of their 

 farrow weight in one week. "When the pigs were two weeks old 

 they weighed on the average 7 pounds each, an increase of 59 per 

 cent, over their weight at the close of the preceding week. Grad- 

 ually the percentage of weekly increase diminished, until with 

 the close of the tenth week it stood at 16 per cent. 



Here the data furnished by the first table closes, and what fol- 

 lows is drawn from the second. Under this division, when the 

 pigs reached an average of 78 pounds each, they gained 7 per 

 cent, of their live weight in one week. Gradually the percentage 

 of increase was reduced, until with the hog weighing 320 pounds 

 it was 3.1 per cent. Had the trials been prolonged there would 

 have come a time when the animals would have eaten no more 

 feed than would maintain them, making no gain whatever, or 

 even falling back in weight. 



In comparing figures like those in the last table we should 

 not forget that the bodies of very young animals are composed 

 largely of water, while with mature ones the proportion of water 

 in the increase is small, the gain being mostly fat. 



847. Length of the fattening period. The following example 

 illustrates why pigs require more and more feed for a given gain 

 as the period of confinement and high feeding lengthens. (565) 

 In a trial conducted by the writer at the Wisconsin Station, l 

 eighteen cross-bred Poland- China Chester White hogs of unusually 

 good bone and constitution were used. Previous to the trial these 

 animals had been on an experiment in the rape and clover field, 

 where they had received a fair allowance of grain, because of 

 which they were in rather high flesh, though they had not reached 

 their normal size. The feed during this trial consisted of two- 

 thirds corn or corn meal and one- third wheat middlings soft- 

 coal ashes and salt being supplied in addition. 



Owing to the strong constitutions and general high quality of 

 these hogs, the writer believes these results are fully as favorable 

 for a long feeding period as stockmen can hope to attain under 

 the best conditions. 



1 Kept. 1897. 



