151 



pigs are produced in a litter, and the Chinese keep only as many as 

 the mother can suckle. The boars are castrated at a month old, the 

 sows spayed at three months. This is done by professional men 

 who castrate both pigs and poultry. Th«y get five cents for each pig 

 castrated and live on these earnings. 



If properly fed the pigs are ready for sale in six months, but 

 generally take a year to fatten enough for sale. Some poorly fed ones 

 take two years to fetch a good price. A well fed pig weighs two 

 piculs and fetches from 14 to 16 dollars a picul. At one time when 

 wild pigs were more abundant the Chinese used occasionally to allow 

 the sows to run in the woods to be crossed by the wild pig, and 

 formerly at Ang mokio I saw a curious looking breed said to have 

 been derived in this way. 



Transport and Trade. 



The pigs are largely exported to the mining districts, alive in 

 long rattan baskets, which are piled one on the top of the other, on 

 carts or on ship board. The opening of the rail from Malacca, and 

 the cultivation of tapioca as a catch-crop for rubber a few years ago, 

 increased the pig industry there very extensively, as the refuse 

 tapioca formed a valuable and large feeding stuff supply and by the 

 railvv'ay it was possible to do a big trade in pork at the mines. 



One of the curious results of the rapid development of rubber 

 cultivation in Singapore has been an extraordinary fall off in the pro- 

 duction of food products, fruit, vegetable and poultry, and at least as 

 much marked that of pigs. The Chinese have in fact planted up the 

 ground occupied formerly by thise produce with rubber, in the wildest 

 way. The result has been that pork is being imported largely from 

 Bangkok to replace it. This is regrettable for the rise in price of 

 food-stuffs is a serious matter, both increasing the cost of living, and 

 interfering with the healthy life of those who cannot afford to purchase 

 pork, vegetables and fruit, at these high prices. It will be noticed 

 that in the feeding of pigs farinaceous food is a necessity and the 

 only suitable materials for this produced in the Peninsula are tapioca 

 and sago refuse. As these products also are to a considerable extent 

 going down, before the triumphant Hevea, the difficulty of increasing 

 the pig-cultivation must increase, and it certainly does not seem to be 

 for the benefit of the population that every little scrap of land should 

 be covered with rubber trees cultivated by small Chinese owners in 

 place of the food-products of the people. We should be able to pro- 

 duce our own supply of fow^ls, ducks, pork and milk .ourselves with- 

 out depending on imports from other countries. 



Disease. 



Formerly there were serious outbreaks of swine fever causing 

 a great mortality not only among the Chinese pigs but also among 

 the wild pigs in the forests. On one occasion many years ago the wild 

 pigs in Singapore were nearly exterminated by the disease and the 

 tigers which live largely on wild pigs all left the island. In Province 



