672 FEEDS AND FEEDING 



sown biennial sweet clover can be pastured during the first summer 

 and fall without much danger of injuring the stand. The second year 

 it grows tall and woody, and the plants will usually die by midsummer if 

 allowed to produce seed. The crop should therefore be pastured heavily 

 early in the season and all tall growth should be cut for hay as soon as 

 the plants begin to bloom. It is sometimes difficult to get swine to eat 

 sweet clover, but they will usually become accustomed to it after a time. 



988. Field peas for pasture. Field peas or a mixture of field peas and 

 oats are often grown for swine pasture in the northern states. (355) 

 These crops provide excellent pasture for a short period, but can not 

 compete with alfalfa, clover, or rape as long-season forages. By sowing 

 rape with oats and peas, excellent pasture may usually be provided until 

 late fall. 



In certain districts of the Northwest where field peas thrive and grain 

 is high in price, many pigs are fattened by allowing them to "hog down" 

 field peas, into which they are turned as soon as the pods begin to 

 ripen. Sometimes the pigs are confined to small plots by temporary 

 fences or hurdles, so they will not waste the crop by trampling it down. 



In trials during 3 years at the Idaho Station 128 with both spring pigs 

 and fall pigs, Gongwer and Hickman found that on the average an acre 

 of peas produced 406 Ibs. of pork. The gains of the pigs were more 

 rapid, but not any more economical, when the pigs were fed a limited 

 amount of grain (rolled barley) in addition to the peas. Sometimes the 

 unthreshed pea vines, after being stacked, are fed to pigs in yards. 



989. Soybean pasture. Soybeans are an important forage crop for 

 swine in the South and also in sandy sections of the North. They do not 

 furnish forage over a long season, as the pigs will often soon destroy the 

 plants if turned into the field early in the season. Therefore, soybeans 

 are usually grown, either alone or with corn, for fall feeding, and the 

 pigs are turned in to hog down the crop after the seeds have begun to 

 harden. As soybean seed is rich in protein, there is probably no ad- 

 vantage in feeding a protein-rich supplement to pigs hogging down 

 soybeans, when they are fed corn in addition. 129 It is, however, usually 

 profitable to feed a protein-rich supplement to pigs hogging down corn 

 in which soybeans have been grown, since most of the feed then usually 

 consists of the corn. (942) 



In the South, soybeans are an excellent forage crop for fall, but in 

 many sections are excelled by peanuts. For example, in 11 trials by 

 Hostetler in North Carolina 130 pigs hogging down soybeans and fed a 

 limited allowance of corn and shorts or tankage in addition gained 0.75 

 Ib. a day and required 168 Ibs. concentrates and 0.52 acre soybeans for 

 100 Ibs. gain. Much poorer results were secured where no grain was fed 

 in addition to the soybeans. In 3 trials by Gray, Eidgeway, and Eudaly 

 in Alabama 131 pigs fed various proportions of corn on soybean pasture 



ias ldaho Bui. 125. 130 Information to the authors. 



128 Robison, Ohio Bui. 343. m Ala. Bui. 154. 



