Hogging-down Corn 233 



The Iowa Experiment Station 1 has done some use- 

 ful work along the line of determining the most valu- 

 able forages to grow in Iowa cornfields which are to be 

 hogged-down. These trials were conducted during the fall 

 of 1909, 1910, and 1911. In 1909 the pigs were turned 

 into the corn on September 14 ; in 1910 on September 9, 

 excepting the lot with Canadian field peas for forage 

 which was started July 29 ; and in 1911 on September 19. 

 The plan was to turn the pigs in as soon as the corn was 

 well dented. The pigs on the Canadian field peas in 

 the 1910 experiment were started at the unusual date of 

 July 29 because the peas were ripe at that time. The 

 various lots were in the corn-fields from 42 to 76 days. 

 The results obtained from the different crops are shown 

 in the preceding table. 



These results are interesting as well as instructive. 

 In the 1909 experiment, soybeans proved themselves 

 a more profitable crop than cowpeas as shown by the 

 rate of gain, total pork produced by an acre of corn and 

 forage, and the cost of the gains. Of the forages tested 

 in the fall of 1910, rape and pumpkins demonstrated their 

 superior qualities. This crop was mostly rape since an 

 average of only forty pumpkins were produced to the 

 acre. The pigs in this lot made faster and cheaper 

 gains and produced considerably more pork from an 

 acre than did those on any of the other forages tested. 

 The authors say concerning the merits of this crop : " Tak- 

 ing everything into consideration on this corn-rape- 

 pumpkin area, the high yield of corn, the good stand 

 of rape with a few pumpkins, the special adaptability of 

 rape as a supplement to corn, the palatability of both 

 rape and pumpkins combined with the vermifugal or 

 1 Eward, Kennedy, and Kildee, Bull. 143. 



