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pen needs a new floor, and the soil underneath is thrown 

 out and replaced with fresh earth. With beaten clay 

 floors, very little liquid will soak into the earth, and if it 

 does, the plant-food which it contains would be" absorbed 

 near the surface, and, by scraping the floors, it would all 

 find its way to the manure heap. 



CHAPTER XVII. 



SWILL BARRELS, PIG TROUGHS, ETC. 



In some convenient place, near the pig pens, there 

 should be a receptacle for the wash from the house, milk, 

 whey, waste vegetables, and other refuse. This is often 

 nothing more than an old pork or cider barrel. It is dif- 

 ficult to conceive of anything more inconvenient. It is 

 too high, and too circumscribed. A far more convenient 

 and inexpensive arrangement is to make a tub out of two- 

 inch pine planks say six feet long, two feet and a half 

 wide, and two feet, or two and a half or three feet high 

 according to the number of pigs kept. Or, what is better 

 still, make such a tub out of plank twelve feet long, and 

 have a partition in the middle. In this way you have 

 two tubs in one. The food for the store pigs can be 

 kept in one, and that for the fattening pigs in the other. 

 In our own case, we find it desirable to have two such 

 tubs, each twelve feet long, and divided in the middle. 

 Such tubs are often made flaring, being wider at the top * 

 than at the bottom. "We do not think there is any ma- 

 terial advantage in this, and it requires more skill to make 

 the grooves fit true, and it is not so easy to furnish them 

 with a tight-fitting cover. The latter is very desirable. 

 It should be put on with hinges, and made of planed and 

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