MANAGEMENT OF THOROUGH-BRED PIGS. 03 



times for the butcher; and if the price is suitable, they 

 can be disposed of, and if not, they can be kept until nine 

 or ten months old, and sold for fat pork. Spring pigs 

 should never be kept on short allowance. It is almost 

 impossible to keep them too fat. To keep them in a half- 

 starved condition until the corn crop is ripe, and then shut 

 them up to fatten, is a very expensive way of making 

 pork. We have known a lot of spring pigs kept in this 

 way, by a farmer who seemed to fear that, if he fed a lit- 

 tle corn during the summer, his pigs would not " grow," 

 that were shut up to fatten in October, and fed soft corn 

 at first, and afterwards sound corn in the ear, all they 

 would eat, that did not, when killed in December, average 

 100 Ibs. each, dressed weight. A well-bred pig of the 

 same age, well-fed from the day he was born, (and before,) 

 would have dressed 300 Ibs. 



CHAPTER XXII. 



MANAGEMENT OF THOROUGH-BRED PIGS. 



The first object in the management of thorough-bred 

 pigs is to secure perfect health. If any animal manifests 

 the slightest tendency to disease of any kind, it must be 

 rigorously rejected. Moreover, if in a litter of pigs there 

 are any defective animals, we would fatten the sow and 

 dispose of her. It is not safe to breed from her. And if 

 the same defect manifests itself in the litters of other 

 sows, bred to the same boar, it is pretty conclusive evi- 

 dence that the boar is not perfectly sound, and he should 

 be at once rejected. No matter how apparently healthy 

 the parents may be, if there is any tendency to disease, or 

 defects in form in the offspring, the probabilities are, that 



