Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1890-07-18
HOGS IN THE U T
Cheap Food, on Which They Thrive Ad-
mirably, Is Abundant.s

mirably, Is Abundant.s
Slowly but surely the south is coming
to the front AZ a hog country. Our
farmers are finding out that the one
crop way of farming is not the best.
They cannot depend upon low priced
cotton to supply their tables with food
and pay for the scores of other necessary
things they need. They are finding that
sending abroad for bacon not only keeps
them poor, but that they can raise a
much better quality Of bacon right at
home than the merchant can supply
them with and at far less cost. They
not only make sweeter hams and Shout
ders, but side meat and lard that are far
superior to the drought on article.
And then the luxuries of good home
made sausages, souse and "fat bread"
which abound at hog killing time. 1t
makes n smack his mouth to think
about them. But here are some of the
reasons why the south is peculiarly
adapted to hog raising:
Our climate is so mild, even in win
ter, that hogs can run in the fields and
woods and find much to feed upon. Our
forests abound i'll nuts of several kinds,
and usually a fine crop of acorns. These
help largely. With a good forest range
hogs need only be given one small feed a
day.
In lieu Of a forest range a good field
OF stock peas is better, and costs but
little labor. Nothing makes better pork
than stock peas, sweet potatoes and
COOLERS. and all of these can be cheaply
raised i'll the south. Indeed, they can
be made cheaper than in corn states of
the northwest, for the reason that when
raised for swine no harvesting is neces-
sary, the hogs doing that work as their
appetite demands. Even cotton seed
has proved to be most excellent pork
making material. A Georgia farmer
has discovered a process for roasting it,
by which the lint-the hitherto fatal
obstacle to its use as hog foods burned
off, the hulls rendered brittle and the
kernels greatly improved. He says: 81
do not at the present time raise any corr
at all.
II roast and grind cotton seed into meal
and feed it to everything I raise. deem
1t equivalent to any food that is ever fed
to animals. 1t is better than oil meal;
It's virtue has not been extracted. 1t
will keep for any length Of time: will not
mold, get musty or turn sour. l can make
as much pork from 100 pounds of roasted
cotton seed as l can from 100 pounds Of
corn" This process of treating cotton
seed will evidently tend to enhance it's
value to the southern farmer, and great
lylncrease his facilities; for raising hogs.
l have found watermelons to be a
profitable crop to feed hogs. They are
cooling and nutritious, and pay well fer
hog food.
Indeed, the south is specially adapted
to such a variety of food crops for swine
that it is strange that more general at
tention has not long since been given to
the hog.
Previous to the war almost every
farmer raised al abundance of bacon.
The war left the country in such a de-
morallzed condition generally that few
of the old southern farmers had the heart
to make III effort to raise hogs, because
hog stealing was SO common. Times are
better now, however, and hog stealing is
not the menac it once was to this branch
OF southern farming. A good dry shed
for them to sleep in is Ill the shelter they
need. With a grass .asture, peach and
plum orchards, a field Of stock peas, a
few acres in sweet potatoes, COOLERS and
melons the southern farmer is "solid"
for plenty of good, cheap bacon. His
surplus labor can then be profitably de-
voted to cotton, corn and a garden, and
with a few horses, COWS. sheep or goats,
and plenty Of poultry, if he is not happy
ne Will be in this world.-Dick
Naylor in Farm and Fireside.