FEEDING AND FATTENING 3I5 



for any of the animals drinking from filthy sloughs or 

 mndholes. If kept in dry lots or fed in pens the hogs 

 should have, at least twice a day. as much clean water 

 as they will drink, and as the foregoing recorded exper- 

 iment of the Indiana station and the experience of prac- 

 tical men amply show, this is no inconsiderable quantity. 

 In dry lots or in pens plenty of trough room should be 

 provided. WMiatever the feed may be, it should be given 

 in such a manner that the hogs will be forced to eat as 

 little filth as possible. When animals, to get their feed, 

 must swallow as much mud and manure as grain only 

 indifferent results may be expected. It is too frequently 

 the practice to confine and feed 50 or more hogs on much 

 less than an acre, where they are compelled to eat. drink 

 and sleep in their own filth ; and after some months of 

 this treatment surprise, entirely unjustifiable, is expressed 

 because they are carried off by that ever-convenient 

 s.capegoat, "cholera," or in some oth.er manner inevitably 

 become a fair quality of carrion. 



CHANGES IN FEEDING 



Any change during the feeding season should be from 

 light to heavier and better fattening feed and never the 

 reverse. The best gains are those which are steadily 

 made, up to the end of the fattening period. When, by 

 gradually increasing- the quantity of fattening food, the 

 lK)gs have become accustomed to it, they should be 

 given at regular hours, early in the morning, at noon, 

 and late in the evening, as much corn as they will eat up 

 clean, ])ut no more. This caution is applical)le to all 



