614 Feeds and Feeding. 



After the pigs have eaten all they will of the ordinary feed they 

 are given a dessert of these balls dipped in milk. The pigs soon 

 learn to sit on their haunches and are fed the dainty morsels one 

 after another in turn, each pig, after eating the thinner food given 

 him in the trough, consuming about a gallon more of these ball 

 mixtures. 



933. Influence of feed on quality of pork. Brewer 1 summarizes 

 his experience in regard to the influence of the food of swine on 

 the quality of the flesh produced, as follows: 



"The best flavored pork and. the heaviest weight of the same 

 was obtained in case of milk-fed swine; next to milk came the 

 cereals corn, barley, oats and peas. Potatoes produced a soft, 

 light pork which loses a good deal in boiling. The meat of swine 

 fed on flour-mill by-products was yellow, without body, and of a 

 poor flavor. Oil meals produced a loose, oily pork of an unpleas- 

 ant flavor. Beans produced a hard, indigestible and flavorless 

 pork, and acorns one that was light, hard and unhealthy." 



No extended work has yet been done in this country on the 

 influence of feeds on pork, and for the present we must be guided 

 by the statements of foreign observers, mainly the Danish inves- 

 tigators. Here is an important field for our Experiment Stations. 

 (885, also various articles in Chapter XXXIV. ) 



934. Correctives for swine. Every stockman who has kept 

 pigs in confinement has observed their strange craving for seem- 

 ingly unnatural substances, sand rock, soft brick, mortar, rot- 

 ten wood, charcoal, soft coal, ashes, soap suds and many other 

 articles being greedily devoured when offered. Such objects 

 lie outside the range of nutritive substances, and we are puzzled 

 to know why they should be so eagerly consumed. In the wild 

 state, the hog ranges through woods and open tracts, living upon 

 small animals, larvae, and vegetation generally. This material is 

 of such character and is gathered in such manner that some of 

 the soil is swallowed with it. With rings in its nose to prevent 

 rooting while in the pasture, confined on board floors during 

 the fattening period and given feeds containing little ash, the 

 pig's life is passed under unnatural conditions. Another cause 



1 Gohren. Futterungslehre, 1872, p. 420. 



