The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1883-10-05
FARM, GARDEN AND HOUSEHOLD.
Feeding of Young Pigs.

More harm is done to young pigs by
overlooking than by any other mistake.
A young pig weighing twenty pounds,
as it should do when it is weancd at four
weeks old, requires only half pound of
solid food daily, divided into four meals,
that is, two ounces at a meal. This
means dry food and a sufficient allow
ance should be made of liquid. For
instance, if milk is the chief part of the
food ten ounces, or little more than half
q pint, will have two ounces of solid
matter in it, and will be sufficient for
meal. Such meal the young animal
will digest with ease, and will thrive
upon it. But how often is pailful of
sour milk thrown to litter of small
weaned pigs, and they are permitted to
gorge themselves upon it Then they do
not grow, but become stunted, and go
with backs bumped up, and appear sick
and weak. Continued Indigestion pro-
duces sour stomach, fetid breath, and
acid secretions which blacken the teeth
and cause sore mouths. Then the owner,
ignorant of the real cause, is led to
believe the popular idea, that the black
teeth are the source of the trouble, and
proceeds to knock them out with stone
or hammer. 1t is rough remedy, but
sometimes it is a cure, reached in a
roundabout manner, however. For the
poor pig, with its sore jaws, cannot eat
for a few days, and the abstinence
actually relieves the disordered stomach
and the pig improves.
Unfortunately this confirms the popu-
lar error about the black teeth, and so
the real cause is never known. But, if
the treatment had been right from the
first the pig would have thriven well,
and there would have been no black
teeth. A.young pig, not overfed, will
make an extraordinary growth. In DR..
Mills experiments, at the Michigan Ag-
ricultural college, six pigs two weeks
old, and weighing an average of four
pounds each, were put in a pen and fed
for six weeks. The first week they ate
twenty-three pounds, or ten quarts Of
milk, each, and gained three and one
half pounds each in weight; the second
week each ate forty-cight pounds, or
twenty-five quarts of milk, and gained
over six pounds each. That week they
ate too much, as was shown in the third
week, when each ate forty-scven' pounds
of milk, and gained only three and three
quarter pounds; the fourth week each
ate tiftv-two pounds of milk, or only
seven and one-half pounds a day, and
gained five pounds. At the end of the
sixth week the six pigs weighed 1924
pounds, or an average of nearly 30t
pounds, equal to gain of six and one
half times their original weight, or an
average daily increase of nearly two
thirds of a pound upon their very small
weight. Had these pigs been fed ten
months and increased in weight in pro-
portion, making due allowance for the
usual reduced ratio of growth, they
would easily have weighed $50 or 400
pounds. But had they been under the
care of less skillful feeder they would
probably have reached a weight Of eighty
or 100 pounds. and have been crawling
around on their launches paralyzed by
the frequent disease commonly called
kidney worms, but really spinal menin-
gifts, which is due in such cases to
chronic indigestion and overlooking.
NeW York Times.