SWINE HOUSING AND FATTENING. 979 



I think it will pay every hog raiser to grow rye for early feed- 

 ing. In its early stages of growth it is succulent and nutritious, 

 and will come on some weeks earlier in spring than any other 

 green crop. I have known cases where a herd was unthrifty 

 and the owner feared cholera, when a run of two weeks in a 

 rye-field in November removed all symptoms of disease and 

 started them into a thrifty growth. A rye-field may be pas- 

 tured till the blue-grass is ready, and then will make a fair 

 crop, which may be "hogged down" or left to cut. Blue-grass 

 in its early stages, or as long as it is kept fed short, is, I think, 

 equal to clover for hogs and better for brood sows. In fact, our 

 best breeders will not turn sows with their litters on a clover- 

 field, as the heavy dew drenches and chills the pigs and injures 

 them. When the clover blossoms, the hogs will make their liv- 

 ing on it until corn is ready to cut up. 



In the chapter on fencing I refer to the fact that allowing 

 hogs to run at large on the farm involves a heavy expense in 

 fencing. It seems to me that no other farm stock could be so 

 easily provided with green food in the pen or barn-yard as hogs. 

 They are not fastidious, like cattle, refusing to eat food which 

 is a little soiled, and a large number of them can be fed on a 

 small spot. Fifty or more hogs could be confined in an acre lot, 

 and fed on the product of a small amount of land, and for their 

 maintenance we have quite a variety of crops that could be 

 easily grown and handled. I should recommend rye for the first 

 and earliest feeding, and should begin to cut it as soon as I 

 could mow a fair swath and before the heads appeared. Clover 

 and oats would follow, and all these crops would, if cut early, 

 give a second cutting. I would also experiment with field beets, 

 peas, and sorgo. The beets I would drill thick in the row on 

 rich land and give thorough cultivation, but would grow them 

 with reference to tops and not roots, and would pull and feed 

 them entire. Peas might be sown broad-cast or in drills, but 

 should be on rich, clean land. Sorgo, when grown for this pur- 

 pose, should be sown in drills much thicker than if to be man- 

 ufactured. For later feeding I doubt if any other crop would 

 produce as much valuable food as sweet corn, and I would 



