The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1905-05-06
FARMER AND PLANTER.
MISTAKES IN HOG RAISING.
Figures Out the Most Profit
to the Raiser.

Why men persist IN raising the ex-
Ira large nogs, can not see. Especial
y bad is this in spring and summer.
Those very large hogs are not what is
wanted at the pens nor are they the
profitable hog for the producer.> They
are too large. The young medium pork
sr is the most profitable to feed and
the best seller A recent stock report
quotes the sale in Cincinnati Of ten
i25 pound hogs at $500, (tops were
tops and the same amount less than
tight shippers and medium hogs Five
dollars and twenty cents was the low
tst price quoted that day on straight
Fat hogs Now those hogs evidently
we're near two years cid and at the
corresponding period last year would
probably have been light shippers
which were worth then $3.50; 200 to
Us is about the right weight for fall
and winter and 125 10 IFS in spring
and summer for then light hogs are
wanted and are the highest price type
often by % cents on the 100 pounds.
Spring pigs should be fattened that
year for the reasons, that they will
then bring the best figure, that they
are less liable to get diseased and that
they are quicker and more proftably
turned into cash. Do not pen your
hogs but rather lot them. Give several
acres to fattening hogs, large range to
stock hogs. Change feeding place as
often as they get it 100 muddy or too
dusty, as the case may be. Some men
are SO thoughtless or careless as to pen
hogs. particularly those for their meat,
in a very small space for the whole
feeding period This they soon work
up into perfect loblolly of mud and
filth. The scent of that pen can be
detected for nearly quarter Of mile
and is detrimental 10 the health of
man and beast would not buy a
hog out of such a place to feed and
would not buy it to ship unless
could get it of right away. for there is
most likely disease in its system. 1t Is
an ideal breeding place for cholera.
Another mistake is in feeding corn or
other feeds when that feed is worth
more than the pork it will produce
There were thousands of hogs fed last
summer On corn worth nearly one cent
pound and the hogs sold at AZ to
5A cents per pound. Many expert
ments show that it takes to pounds
OF dry corn to produce a pound OF
pork. Figuring on this basis it is
easy to see that there is not much
profit there. But others made pork
out of the cheaper feeds such as, clover,
grasses. peas, grainfield pickings, etc.
Others feed too long-after they cease
to put on pounds profitably. That
plan of making them extra tight does
not recommend itself TO me as being
proper. That man who has a car or
even half carload on feed has de-
cidedly the advantage of the one with
Just few for he is in position to get
the last dollar by shipping for himself.
or il he prefers to sell at home the
trader can better afford to figure very
close with him ON car or half car
in one place. He is saved the time
and expense of buying and collecting
many small herds and can buy with
more certainty of getting that days
figures. 1t certainly is mistake to
hog down corn as some men do. The
hogs break down the stalks. eat part
of each ear. pass on to new one and
so on leaving from one-third to one
half of the ear to spoil. This trouble
can be partly Offset by allowing pIen-
ty of shoats that are too small to
break down the stalks. These will
have to eat the down and partly eaten
ears. But is the fodder of no value?
/ always thought the man who hogs
down his corn, did It not because he
thought 1t the wisest thing to do, but
because he was too lazy to cut and
feed in the regular way. The way
some men hog corn down results in the
wasting of about one-third the corn
and all the fodder. Hogs should not
be fed in the opposite end of a large
field. to the one with the water and
shade so that they come up painting
and almost too tired to cat Nor is hill
profitable exercise for fat
porkers. 1t takes of the pounds that
you are striving to put on. 1t is better
10 have a small lot or field with water
and shade for shelter in abundance.
Most farmers wait until late in the fall
to fatten their hogs as is evidenced by
the large receipts at the stockyards in
and December. This is
probably to feed the corn when
cribbed, but the expense of cribbing
can be saved by early feeding, a bet
ter quality of fodder secured, higher
price for the product and much dryer
and more pleasant season for feeding.
Then too no animal that is fed out-of-
doors. will put on pound as fast as in
warm and dry weather such
as we have in September and October.
e. w. Jones, in Epitomist-