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sive labor. "We can let them go to grain and straw, seeding 

 clover in the spring so as to have them in hay for another 

 year, or we can feed these crops down with pigs. Our peach 

 crop this year will be a failure. The buds and many of the 

 trees have evidently been killed by the hard winter. With 

 our cover crops we can substitute pigs for peaches, and ob- 

 tain a fair income through the substitution. 



My experience last summer convinced me that we have 

 never given the pig a fair run for his money. We have mis- 

 taken his nature, and he has made us pay for the mistake. 

 Many of us were brought up to believe that the only way to 

 keep a pig is to build a small pen, perhaps 8 feet square and 

 six feet deep in mud ; and turn the poor thing in, feeding him 

 on swill and table scraps. Or we think the only thing a pig 

 is good for is working over the manure pile and living a 

 lazy, shiftless life in a small pen. The fact of it is that the 

 pig is a grazing animal, just as much so as the sheep or cow, 

 if you will only give him a start. I found that out last sum- 

 mer, and the knowledge has proved a good asset for us. I 

 can put a portable fence around a part of the vetch and rye. 

 turn my pigs in. put in a self-feeder with ground oats, tank- 

 age or any cheaper grain, give them plenty of wood ashes 

 and charcoal, plenty of water, and an oiler for them to rub 

 against, and let them alone. They will do the rest. They 

 will harvest the rye and vetch, and then move on to another 

 field. They will keep clean, healthy, and grow into pork 

 while you wait. Many people make the mistake of turning 

 a drove of hogs into an old orchard, where there never was 

 any feed, and expect the pig to play the part of a clover 

 plant and get nitrogen, and everything else, out of the air. 

 That is a good way to raise runts, but no way to make pork. 

 I have found that the green pasture crop will just about 

 furnish a living, and a little growth on the pig, but you 

 must feed grain to some extent in order to get full growth. 

 I believe that we shall find that this substitution of pigs for 

 peaches in a season like this, will give a profitable invest- 

 ment. A crop of oats and peas, or of rape, can be seeded in 



