FEEDS FOR SWINE 



375 



vetch, cowpea, soybean, and other legume pasture in summer, and in 

 winter feed freely of well cured hay from the legumes, in order to 

 have healthy animals and to keep down the cost of production. The 

 finer parts of clover and alfalfa hay, especially the first cutting of 

 clover and the last cutting of alfalfa, are often as valuable for feed- 

 ing pigs as is the same weight of expensive wheat middlings. The 

 southern planter has a specially choice list of equally valuable legumes 

 in the cowpea, soybean, velvet bean, peanut, etc. Legume hay may 



Fig. 106. — Brood Sows Eatixg At>falfa Hay FKO^r Uacks 



Fine. Avell-cured legume hay should be provided for all brood sows and may 

 often be used with profit for other pigs. (From Breeder's Gazette.) 



be fed to pigs from slatted racks or from boxes with openings low on 

 the sides from which the animals can eat at will. The legume hays 

 not only furnish protein, so essential for building all the lean meat 

 tissues and the organs of the body, but they also carry much calcium 

 (lime), which is needed in bone building. They are therefore doubly 

 useful in supplementing Indian corn and the other cereals, which are 

 rather poor in both protein and calcium. 



Leafy, bright alfalfa hay is the best of all hays for the pig. Not 

 only is this hay useful for brood sows and stock pigs but it is a cheap 

 and fairly efficient supplement to corn or the other cereals for fatten- 

 ing pigs. While fattening cattle and sheep will consume enough 

 alfalfa hay to make a fairly well balanced ration with corn, the fat- 



