CHAPTER IV 

 THE FREE-CHOICE SYSTEM 



Let us fix in our minds at the outset what we mean by the free- 

 choice system of feeding. This system, experimentally demonstrated 

 and developed by the Animal Husbandry Section of the Iowa Ex- 

 periment Station, is one wherein the animals fed are allowed to 

 have the feeds placed before them in separate containers, so that 

 they may choose or partake of whichever they will. These feeds 

 may be continuously kept before them or they may be allowed peri- 

 odically. In the former case the system then would be free-choice 

 self -fed, but in the latter free-choice hand-fed. In the former case 

 self-feeders with different feeds within will be placed before the 

 animals, and in the latter open troughs would naturally be used, 

 each containing a separate feed, these to be placed before the ani- 

 mals, which will eat what they will, and after a certain limited time, 

 say an hour or two, or at such times that the animals are satisfied, 

 the troughs may be removed, to be replaced again at a later period. 

 Self -feeding may be practiced with a mixture of feeds; in other 

 words, corn 90 parts and tankage 10 parts, both ground and mixed 

 together, may be fed in an open container. On the other hand, 

 these feeds might be fed free-choice style, both in separate troughs. 

 Let us not, therefore, confuse self -feeding with free-choice feeding : 

 they are two separate and distinct plans. 



Does Self-Feeding Pay? It does, particularly when one 

 wishes to fatten animals. One can even self-feed brood sows, and 

 this is consistently done on pasture, the pasture in this case being 

 self -fed, or sows may be self-fed on alfalfa hay allowed in a rack, 

 or ground alfalfa mixed with the grain ration, and so on. But in 

 these cases the character of the feeds is such that when self -fed they 

 do not unduly fatten. When we wish to self-feed fattening animals 

 we instinctively use the most highly concentrated feeds, such as 

 Indian corn, milk, and meatmeal tankage, white flour middlings, 

 young tender alfalfa, rape, or clover, and other pastures, and so on. 

 In all of our tests with self-feeding versus hand-feeding, when we 

 used a ration the basis of which was corn those with young growing 

 and fattening pigs as well as for fattening shotes and fattening sows 

 have practically all shown up in favor of self -feeding, in that there 

 is a greater average daily gain made, more feed eaten daily, and less 

 feed required for 100 pounds of gain by the self -fed group. This 

 of course means greater profit on the pig, if any profit is made, and 

 that at less labor cost. 



Returns From Experiments. It would be superfluous to set 

 out even a small portion of our experiments, but we are giving a 

 couple which illustrate the practicability of self-feeding. In one 

 experiment where we fattened well-grown yearling hogs weighing 



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