1871.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
15 
17 cents per bushel, while I sold the balance of 
my corn at the crib for 50 cents per bushel. 
This 'salted' me from hog feeding until October, 
1869." "Without knowing the fact, I should sup- 
pose the trouble was not in buying them too 
fat, but in paying too much per lb. for them. 
"In October, 1869," he continues, "I went into 
the business again. I bought 20 sows, and 60 
pigs and shoats. During the winter, 60 pigs 
were born. In the spring I had not 80 left, all 
told ! In March and April 60 more were 
dropped, of which 30 remain — balance dead. 
Have had 80 pigs within six weeks — 20 dead, 
and dying daily. I intend to try further. Will 
have 40 sows to drop their pigs next spring." 
This seems bad luck, but I am glad he is not 
discouraged. "When I first commenced to turn 
my attention to pigs, I had, though on a much 
smaller scale, quite as "bad luck." I had 3 
sows that dropped their litters oue night in the 
yard, and lost nearly eveiy pig — as I deserved to 
do. I have now some 50 pigs,aud by giving them 
careful attention, plenty of appropriate food, 
with warm, dry and clean pens, I anticipate no 
trouble. The last three sows produced 30 pigs, 
and I saved every one. I know that it is a gen- 
eral impression that you cannot keep a large 
number of breeding sows on one farm; but I 
cannot see why, provided each sow gets as good 
treatment as she would if she was the only pig 
on the farm. If this cannot be done, then do 
not attempt to keep them, for, as a rule, farmers 
who keep only one or two sows, do not treat 
them an}' too w r ell. 
There is one thing that is very important: 
"We should know exactly when we are to ex- 
pect the little ones, and make provision for their 
comfort beforehand. Pigs are remarkably sen- 
sitive to cold winds. They must have warm, 
dry, well-ventilated quarters ; and m\ r rule is to 
have the pens cleaned out every day, just as 
regularly as we clean out the horse stable. 
Why should they not be? "It is too much 
trouble, and will not pay." This is a great mis,- 
take. In the first place, if done every day, it takes 
only a few minutes' time to remove the soiled 
litter and shake up the bed ; and if it pays at all 
to raise pigs with the present average rate of 
mortality, it will certainly pay if we can suc- 
ceed in saving the entire litter. I am inclined 
to think that, taking the country through, from 
one-third to one-half of the pigs die — and this 
through sheer neglect and mismanagement. 
One of my neighbors, who is a very good far- 
mer, and takes capital care of his cows, keeps 
his pigs in a pen covered at one end with some 
straw, thrown on rails. This is very well. 
Though open in front, it does afford some shel- 
ter. But the pen is built on the side of a build- 
ing, and all the rainfrom the roof comes pouring 
into the pen. He " did not believe it paid to 
feed pigs any way," he said, and I presume he 
spoke from experience. 
There are some lucky men in this world. 
Here is a letter from one at Troy, Ohio. " I 
have," he writes, " ten acres of land that I de- 
sign planting with corn, i" can get all the ma- 
nure I want for nothing, except drawing it a 
quarter of a mile. I intend to put on a heavy 
coating of manure; and then I thought of tak- 
ing two parts of ashes, three of earth, and one of 
hen manure, mixing well, and putting a little to 
each hill after it comes up. Now, what I want 
to ask is, whether you think this will be giving 
the corn too much ? and whether I can continue 
to grow corn every year, for ten years, without 
any other crop ?" 
If I could get all the manure I wanted for 
nothing, I do not think I should spend much 
time in making a compost of ashes, earth, and 
hen dung. If any one would make the com- 
post and put it on for me I would let them. I 
have no doubt it would do good. Everybody 
says so that is in the habit of using it. 
I would draw out the manure — say 600 two- 
horse loads — during the winter and pile it in 
the field. Turn it once or twice, and try to get 
it thoroughly rotted. It takes about three loads 
of ordinary stable manure to make one load of 
well-rotted manure. The 600 loads, therefore, 
would be reduced to 200, or 20 loads per acre. 
If the manure is good, this is a fair dressing, 
and will do to commence with. I would plow 
from half to two-thirds of the manure under, 
and apply the remainder to the surface, and 
work it in with a harrow. "With plenty of ma- 
nure, corn can be grown on the land every )'ear 
almost indefinitely. But why grow corn ? 
Where a farmer has access to all the manure 
ho wants at a mere nominal expense, he should 
make his land as rich as possible, and then grow 
crops that require a large amount of labor per 
acre, such as onions, carrots, parsnips, beets, 
cabbages, etc. Or he might grow garden seeds 
or nursery stock. It requires no more seed, 
and no more labor in sowing, weeding and hoe- 
ing an acre of onions, that yields from 1,000 to 
1,200 bushels, than one so poor as to yield only 
200 bushels, and those of inferior quality. 
Sometime ago I told you that we had drawn 
out our manure upon a wheat stubble that was 
seeded down, but on which the clover had par- 
tially or almost entirely failed to catch. I said 
my object in doing so was three-fold. First, if 
it should prove that there was sufficient clover 
the manure would help it ; second, if it proved 
to have failed almost entirely I could plow un- 
der the manure and what c,lover there was in 
the spriug, and plant corn; and third, that I 
could not plow under this manure last fall and 
sow wheat, because I was afraid that the ma- 
nure contained the seeds of weeds. I thought 
by spreading the manure on the land in August 
and harrowing it repeatedly, so as to break all 
the lumps, the rains would wash it into the soil 
and also cause the weed seeds to germinate, and 
if the land was plowed in the spring, and after- 
wards thoroughly cultivated with corn, the 
weeds would all be destroyed ; and if on the 
other hand the land was kept in pasture next 
year, or mown early for clover hay, the weeds 
would also be prevented from seeding, and be 
ultimately killed. My good friend, John John- 
ston, wrote me at once as follows : " I cannot 
resist writing to tell you that I don't believe you 
can kill the weeds in manure b}' putting it on 
the land in autumn, and pasturing next sum- 
mer. I never saw stock that would eat weeds 
if they could get any thing else. They won't 
even eat quack grass as long as they can help 
it. I once knew a farmer that killed a field of 
quack by pasturing it with sheep, and planting 
corn the following season, but no sensible man 
would have received the sheep as a gift when 
taken from the quack. The true way to kill 
the foul seeds in manure is to get out the ma- 
nure in September, and spread and pulverize as 
fine as possible, and plow the land the next 
spring before the 10th of May [and I suppose 
plant corn], In that way only did I succeed in 
killing bad weeds. You will exease the liberty 
I have taken, but I have a wish to keep you 
right, if I am right!" 
That is the spirit in which to write. This 
noble old farmer, one of the most experienced 
and successful in the State, knows that I try a 
good many experiments and am never afraid to 
report the result whether a failure or a success. 
To use a slang phrase, " he has been through 
the mill." Like every farmer from Jethro Tull 
to the latest graduate of one of our own agri- 
cultural colleges, who deviates from the beaten 
track, he had to endure the sneers and unfavor- 
able prognostications of his neighbors. They 
asserted so freely and so frequently that he was 
a fool, that at times, he says, he almost suspect- 
ed that they were right, and he used to hide his 
head in one of the underdrains he was cutting 
as these wise men passed by. 
It is always unpleasant, and for the time being, 
generally unprofitable, to fly in the face of gen- 
eral opinion. A wise man will listen to all the 
reasons which can be given against any plan he 
proposes to adopt. He will think the matter 
over carefully in his own mind, looking at it on 
all sides, and if hois satisfied that his plan prom- 
ises the best' results, in the circumstances, he 
must carry it out as best he may — and let his 
neighbors talk. If he can give a good reason 
for his faith and practice, let him not be dis- 
couraged at their remarks, for as a rule, all the 
reason they can offer is : "We don't think so," 
or "You will never make farmers believe it." 
They have told me this a hundred times, and I 
cannot help feeling and, I fear, sometimes say- 
ing, "who cares whether they believe it or not?" 
I believe I was the first writer who contended, 
on chemical reasons, that with manure properly 
treated, there was little loss of ammonia from 
spreading it out and letting it He on the surface of 
the land. John Johnston was the first writer 
who claimed the same thing as the result of 
practical experience and observation. Mr. 
Johnston's plan is to " pile " his manure in the 
spring and draw it on to the grass land he in- 
tends to break up for corn in the spring. The 
most general practice in this section is to draw 
out the fresh manure from the yards in spring 
and plow it under for corn at once. For my 
part I do not know which is the better plan, so 
far as the ultimate effect of the manure is con- 
cerned. "We save a year's time, and the trouble 
of " piling," and avoid all possible risk of loss 
from leaching and fermentation. Oil the other 
hand the fresh manure will not act as quickly 
as when fermented in the piles; and if it con- 
tains the seeds of weeds there is no opportunity 
of destroying them until the land is planted to 
corn four or five years hence. The bulk of the 
manure, too, can be reduced about two-thirds 
with little or no loss of any valuable ingredient. 
It is less labor to draw it out and spread it ; and 
when it lies on the surface six or eight months 
the rains wash the soluble salts into the land, 
and the manure is thoroughly mixed with the 
soil — a point undoubtedly of great importance. 
Whenever I am asked my opinion as to the best 
time of applying manure, I always say "when 
most convenient." The truth is, a farmer must 
decide all such questions for himself. It de- 
pends so much on circumstances that what is 
best for John Johnston may not be best for me, 
and what is best for me may not be best for 
you. I draw out considerable manure in the 
winter, simply because it is a leisure season for 
men and horses — and horses are so terribly ex- 
pensive, not only in first cost, but in keeping, 
shoeing, attendance, wear and tear, etc., that I 
aim to keep them employed as regularly 
as possible. I believe few farmers realize what 
it costs them to keep horses or they would not 
let them lie idle so frequently. I know farmers 
