CARE OF THE BROOD SOW 87 



A small per cent, in weight of a good quality bran added to any 

 of the above makes a valuable addition. 



Plenty of Water. One thing must not be overlooked, and 

 that is plenty of clean fresh water. If it can be had at will, so 

 much the better; if it cannot, it should at least be given once or 

 twice daily, for the hog needs a drink of water as much as any 

 other animal or human being. I have known pigs to walk directly 

 from a wet feed of nice rich slop to a drinking fountain and take a 

 good drink of water, as though they had been fed on dry feed. I 

 really think that the majority of breeders and farmers overlook 

 this matter of letting the hogs have plenty of water to drink. 



Further, the brood sows during the season should, if possible, 

 have some kind of green feed or pasture. Of course in parts of the 

 country where there is heavy snow, something must be fed to take 

 the place of pasture. There is nothing equal to the third or fourth 

 cutting of alfalfa for this purpose. This, if cured without being 

 damaged by rains, is practically as green as it would be in June, 

 and is greatly relished. It can be fed in racks, properly made, 

 and mentioned elsewhere in this book, or it may be run through a 

 power cutter and chaffed and fed with a portion of the grain ration, 

 as above recommended. A mixture of salt, charcoal, wood ashes 

 and ground limestone or slacked lime is absolutely necessary, and 

 if convenient add also a portion of ground phosphate rock. This 

 mixture adds much in the way of mineral matter that is so neces- 

 sary in building up the bone and frame of the unborn litter. 



Brood sows should have a dry warm place to sleep, and but few 

 in number not over ten or twelve should run together or sleep 

 in one compartment. This is to avoid their crowding or piling up 

 too closely. 



The future of the pig depends much, in fact more than is usually 

 realized, on what the dam receives in feed and care before the birth 

 of the litter. "A litter well born is half raised," and there should 

 be no immediate change in the feeding formula for the sow having 

 just farrowed a litter of pigs from what she has been having dur- 

 ing the period of gestation, only after farrowing the sow should go 

 at least twenty-four hours without feed, with what water she will 

 drink, which in cold weather should be given her with the chill 

 taken off; then,' a very light portion of the same feed she has been 

 having. If she has been fed a dry feed, it would be well to use the 

 same proportion in the mixture, only feed it as a slop, with warm 

 water during the winter in a cold climate, and cold water if in the 

 southern states. 



This feed should be gradually increased as the litter is able to 

 take all the milk furnished by the mother. Usually at the end of 

 one week, if the litter is an average sized one, the sow can be fed 

 all she will eat up clean. 



By the time the pigs are three weeks old they will eat a little on 

 the side from the trough with their mother, and if it is desired to 

 push them to the limit in growth, a small feeding space can be 



