BRITISH PIG SHORTAGE.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 814, 11 May 1910, Page 8

BRITISH PIG SHORTAGE.

BACON A SHILLING A POUND. Yesterday's mail brings further evidence of the scarcity of pics in Great Britain. The Stock Journal" of April 1 says:—'Consumers of the morning . rasher .are much concerned at the increased price of bacon, due to an extraordinary shortness in the number of pigs in the exporting countries, as wcllns our own. A shilling a pound is charged by the grocer l'or' even moderately good cuts, and probably, moro for the choicest. So far as the reduced supplies from the United States are accountable for high prices, no relief- seems probable for some timo to come.. Tho beginning of the reduction in production iras tho autumn of: 1907, when, and through,the succoeding winter, fat pigs were selling at quite unremuneratiro prices, so that breeding was reduced greatly. Drought in 1908, .by drying streams and springs, caused many breeders and feeders to sell out -of pigs entirely. When prices rose there was no faith in their continuance, and the high price of maize in 1909 was; a potent discouragement to pig' feeding. Authorities in tho .'United States are of opinion that tho. great reduction.' in the pigs of that country will not bo made for eome years, and that the speed of _ recovery will be dependent upon tho maize crops. Official figures quoted last week mate the number of pigs 9,200,000 fewer than it was in 1901."