GENERAL MANAGEMENT OF THE HOG. 209 



STORE HOGB. 



" Of store hogs little need be said they are intended either for 

 sale, or as future bacon hogs. They should be kept in fair condition, 

 not too low, and their health should be attended to ; they should be 

 allowed to run in the fields or in the woods and copses, when the 

 beechmast or acorns are falling, and be regularly and moderately 

 fed at certain intervals, say in the morning and evening ; knowing 

 their feeding times, by habit, they will never willingly be absent, 

 and wherever they may ramble during the day, their return at the 

 appointed time in the evening may be safely calculated upon. After 

 their evening meal they should be secured in their sty, and snugly 

 bedded up. 



HOGS FATTENING FOR BACON 



" Bacon-hogs (we here except breeding sows, destined after two or 

 three litters for the butcher) are generally put up to fatten at the 

 age of twelve or eighteen months. Under the term bacon-hogs, we 

 include the barrows and spayed females chosen by the breeder or 

 feeder for fattening, after the age admissible as porkers. In the fat- 

 tening of bacon-hogs much judgment is requisite. It will not answer 

 to over-feed them at first ; under such a plan they will loses their 

 appetite, become feverish, and require medicine. They should be fed 

 at regular intervals ; this is essential ; animals fed regularly thrive 

 better than those fed at irregular intervals, nor should more food be 

 given them at each meal than they will consume. They should be 

 sufficiently satisfied, yet not satiated. It would be as well to vary 

 their diet; midlings, peas, potato-meal, and barley -meal may be 

 given alternately, or in different admixtures with wash, whey, butter- 

 milk, skim-milk, and the occasional addition of cut grasses, and other 

 green vegetables ; a little salt should be scattered in their mess it 

 will contribute to their health, and quicken their appetite ; a stone 

 trough of clean water should be accessible, and the feeding-troughs 

 should be regularly cleaned out after every meal. The sty should 

 be free from all dirt, and the bed of straw comfortable ; indeed, it is 

 an excellent practice to wash and brush the hides of the animals, so as 

 to keep the skin clean, excite the circulation of the cutaneous vessels 

 and open the pores. Pigs thus treated will fatten more kindly than 

 dirty, scurfy animals put upon better fare. This essential point is 

 greatly neglected, from the too common idea that the pig is naturally 

 a filthy brute, than which nothing can be more untrue j it is the 

 keeper who is filthy, and not the animal, if he constrain a pig to 

 wallow in a disgusting sty. 



" Too many pigs should not be fed in the same sty ; three are 

 sufficient, and they should be, as far as possible, of the same age ; 



