1857. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



121 



en this 3'ear for the jirst time, to send an agent (if 

 you choose to call it so,) to visit some of the farm- 

 ers of the county ; men having heads so cool as to 

 know what they are doing with fertilizers, and how 

 they do it, and who can show it ; yet men so mod- 

 est, so obscure, it may be, as to be quite below the 

 horizon to your correspondent. It may be, as your 

 correspondent says, they "need not be afraid to tell 

 truly what they have done." Aye, but they must 

 be the judges of that. AVhen a farmer says to me, 

 "I am willing to have every body know what I have 

 done, if it will do any good ; but I don't want my 

 name to go into the books and papers," I am then 

 to decide whether the public shall oe deprived of a 

 knowledge of important experiments, or that I shall 

 say to him, "Sir, your name shall not be published, 

 if you saj' so." I choose the latter; and if your 

 correspondent doubts whether I have "told truly," 

 let him call on the Hon. Mr. Dodge, our well- 

 known secretary, obtain the name of Mr. A., and all 

 others, to Mr. Z., and commence his mission of in- 

 quiry ; it may be useful to him. He may find clear 

 heads, that he does not at present know of; and a 

 greater amount of unwavering veracity than he 

 seems to give our county credit for. 



I may have betrayed some uncalled-for warmth 

 upon the subject; but it seems to be intimated 

 that farming "operations have been hid under a 

 bushel," when the only trouble is that the com- 

 plainant does not know how to set the candle upon 

 a candlestick ; a thing, which, if he had done, he 

 would have found it was able to give light to all 

 that were in the house. David Cuoate. 



Essex, Dec. 29, 1856. 



COOKING FOOD FOR HOGS. 



During the past few years we have published 

 many valuable articles upon the subject of fattening 

 swine. It is one in which not only every farmer's 

 famil}^, but very many of those of other trades and 

 professions are interested. The convenience of a 

 barrel of home-made pork and a pot of sweet lard 

 is never denied by any good housewife, but the ques- 

 tion of profit and loss in raising pork is very often 

 discussed. 



In the Monthly Farmer for April, 1854, and in 

 that for July, 1855, are two articles by our editori- 

 al associate, Mr. Holbrook, of Brattleboro', Vt., in 

 which he gives in detail, and in his usual practical 

 manner, the system of feeding and management by 

 which with corn at 85 cents to $1,25 per bushel, 

 and pork at 7 to 8 cents a pound, he makes good 

 hard pork at a fair profit. He grinds the corn with 

 the cob, and cooks the meal. Without grinding 

 and cooking, he says expressly that in New Eng- 

 land it is not profitable to fatten swine on corn. At 

 the West, where corn is raised more easily than at 

 the East, and where its market value is very much 

 less, corn is usually fed whole and uncooked, and 

 in some sections hogs are turned into the fields and 

 allowed to help themselves ; thus saving the trou- 

 ble of both harvesting and feeding out the grain. 

 But even there, the policy of such a course is be- 

 ginning to be questioned by the best farmers. Ou 



the 16th of last July Mr, Samuel H. Clay, of Bour- 

 bon Co., Ky., commenced a series of experiments, 

 with six barrows, each about twelve months old, to 

 determine the advantages of cooking food for hogs, 

 the results of which we find in the Valley Farmer 

 for Deceml)er. 



In the first place the hogs were wjighed and all 

 fed alike for 12 days, on cooked meal and dry 

 corn at the same time. No. 1, gained 39 lbs. ; No. 

 2, 33 lbs.; No. 3, 50 lbs. ; No. 4, 36 lbs. ; No. 5, 25 

 lbs. and No. 6 gained 37 lbs. They were then sep- 

 arated by pairs, fed for 30 days and gained pounds 

 of pork for each bushel of corn as follows : 



Nos. 1 and 2, fed on boiled corn gained 14i lbs. 



Nos. 3 and 4, fed on cooked meal gained 16^ lbs. 



Nos. 6 and 6, fed on dry corn gained 5| lbs. 



For the next twenty-six days the feed of Nos. 3 

 and 4, and 5 and 6 was reversed. The boiled cons 

 was continued to Nos. 1 and 2, with about the same 

 result as in first experiment. The change with the 

 other four resulted as follows : 



Nos. 3 aud 4, instead of cooked meal, had dry com, aod 

 gained 6| lbs. pork to a bushel of corn 



Nos. 6 and 6, instead of dry corn, had cooked meal, aad^ 

 gained ITJ lbs. pork to a bushel of corn. 



With corn at 28 cents a bushel, these experi- 

 ments show that each pound of gain, cost as follows : 



On dry corn, pork cost i\ cts. per ft. 



On bailed corn, pork cost 2 cts. per lb. 



On cooked meal, pork cost l.i cts. per lb. 



Mr. Clay prepares his "cooked meal," by putting 

 50 pounds into a sixty-gallon kettle, and then fills 

 it up with water. When cooked, this makes 405 

 pounds of slop. To make Mr. Clay's results corres- 

 pond with those of Mr. Holbrook, one-fifth of the 

 gain must be deducted for shrinkage or loss in dress- 

 ing. This deduction will show a very close corres- 

 pondence in the results of the experiments of these 

 gentlemen, as to the amount of pork which a bush- 

 el of corn will produce with proper management. 



For the I\'ew England Fanner. 



COUNTY SHOWS. 



I have noticed in your journal for the last month, 

 a short article on one of our county fairs, in which 

 you were kind enough to speak favorably of the 

 exhibition as compared with those of former years. 



In the fruit department a great effort was made 

 to bring forward the best specimens that the season 

 afforded. The writer of this devoted two entire 

 days in collecting such as would do him and the 

 exhibition credit, and had the mortification of see- 

 ing his name published in the list of other more 

 meritorious victims, as having been complimented by 

 two gratuities of fifty cents each. This led him to 

 add up the whole amount of premiums and gratui- 

 ties on fruits, ivhic.'i ivas either nineteen dollars and 

 ffty cents or twenty dollars. 



On asking the question why the amount was 

 so much smaller than formerly, he was told that 

 it was owing to the great outlay for the exhibition 

 of fast horses. 



It is my opinion that we are all overboard, and 

 the sooner a plank is thrown to us the better. 



Conservation. 



