MODERN PIG-KEEPING

Northern Advocate, 27 July 1935, Page 14

MODERN PIG-KEEPING

The Animal,

It has frequently been declared that the pig is the cleanest of all animals, and it undoubtedly is if given a chance. A visitor to Denmark tells of a large pig house he there saw. It was owned by a Dane who had gone to America,' married an American woman who had much money, and who had returned to Denmark and- established a piggery on which no money was spared. His main building was made to accommodate 5000 pigs. Alongside each pen was a passageway which led to an outside passageway running the whole length of the building. And every one of the 3000 pigs housed in the building at the time used that passageway for dunging purposes. The pens were thus kept remarkably clean. At the present time Danish pig houses are going up all over England, and a feature of them is the dunging passage. A very progressive settler of the Koromatua district, Mr F. A. Caley, has adopted the dunging passage in a very good concrete finishing house, and with the most satisfactory results. Mr Fred Discombe tells of an old pigman he knew who when he brought home any pigs would never put them straight into the house they were to occupy. He would fence off a corner of the field with a few hurdles and keep them there for a day or so. Then they would always return to their first corner for dunging purposes, as pigs invariably will do. For this reason Mr Discombe agrees with the preference Mr Peirson, Recording Officer, has for the house being at the back of the paddock, as then there will never be any manure about the feeding end.

The Ton Litter.

The ton litter continues to make good progress, though in the past fourteen days the average gain per pig has been but I.llb a day. This was mainly due to sickness of two of the litter, whose low gains of weight reduced the average of the lot. The pigs, now twenty weeks old, show a total weight for the thirteen of 18141 b, or an average of 1401 b per pig. Thus it will be necessary for the litter to make a gain of 8001 b if it is to attain the record of a ton in six months. If weather conditions improve Mr Porritt believes it will be done. The feeding for the past fourteen days has been the same as it was for the preceding fourteen days. This, in the recorder’s opinion, was a wrong policy. There should have been an increase in the food with an increase in the weight. With the same amount of food, a probably increased amount of water in the separated milk (as this is collected from the factory) and the

cold and wet conditions there was a combination of conditions antagonistic to good progress. The total results to date are, however, most satisfactory, while the condition and general health of the pigs are a credit to the feeder. The Large Whites in this litter were bred from a maiden boar and a maiden sow. The boar is quarter English, but the sow is pure Canadian. Undoubtedly the progeny of this mating are the type of pig the country wants. It is commonly said that the Large White will not thrive under open air conditions like other breeds, that it must be better done. But in one fortnight, when the average gain in weight was l£lb a day, there were only two days on which there was no rain, and the only dry spot the pigs had was in their little shed. This is absolutely draught proof and there is always good dry bedding. Slats were not used in building the house but building paper, kept in position by wire netting, was used inside to provide draught proof conditions. The outside cpnditions could hardly have been worse. Danish Methods. In conjunction with the Danish method of housing there is also being introduced into England the Danish method of feeding, a method originated at the famous Lindholm Experimental Farm, near Copenhagen. This is the addition to the ordinary grain ration of a special food whieh contains all the necessary mineral matter properly balanced, thus making any food provided quite complete. As this food is very concentrated only very small quantities are required. The New Zealand Co-operative Pig Marketing Association has arranged for the manufacture of a similar food in this' country, which will be marketed under the name of Vitameal. This will do away with all the worry of providing licks, and especially of providing the sow with the special food she should have before farrowing, particularly in regard to minerals.

The Large White,

Mr Porritthas had some disappointments before the present desirable, types of the breed were secured, and several expensive' pigs have had to be discarded. He has tried both English and Canadian and he now believes that some Canadian strains are better than the English. He is definitely proving, however, that there are good, and very good, strains of the Large Whites in this country. But a man wants to know the true type of the Large White, for selection must be keenly done. Every Large White in England is not of the right type. Apparently they have, as we have, many poor strains,, the narrow,*leggy type. In a lecture delivered in England at the end of May, on “The Right Type of Animal to Breed,” the speaker said: “No doubt the Large White at the moment is the best type of modern bacon pig, but there are good and bad Large Whites; indeed, we know of no worse pig than the very narrow Large White, long in the leg, and coarse in both bone and hair, which breeders have evolved to get a long, lightshouldered and lean pig, and, neglecting the need for quality and thriving power, have gone completely to the other extreme, and to the bad so far as feeding for baton is concerned.” And is not this English experience being repeated in this country? The right type of Large White is undoubtedly a great pig, and those who hgve the right type swear by it. just as those who have ’unfortunately been landed with the wrong type condemn the breed altogether. It is the strain, not the breed, that is wrong, and the only thing that will eliminate the undesirable strains is systematic pig recording. In the matter of right ar

wrong types of the Large Whites, however, a man’s eye, if be has any eye' at all for type, should be a good enough guide. The breeder of any type of animal will condemn the narrow leggy animal. It is all very well to aim at length and a fine shoulder, but it is sheer madness to breed for such characters at the expense of constitution and the characters that go with it, rapid maturity and economical gain in weight. The thriving economical pig must come first.

Rate of Feeding.

In a big pig farm in England, where the feeding is done on the Danish system, the rule of feeding is to give 11b of food a day for each month of age. That is the pig that is a month old gets 11b of food a day, the two months old pig 21b,and finally the six months old pig gets 61b a day. The most important fact in feeding is that the food should be gradually increased with increasing weight, and the expert feeder is he who most strictly adheres to this rule. And the expert will always give the food in a thoroughly clean trough. A pig appreciates appetising food probably more than any other animal. If a Pig dirty it is man who ma£es it so. Why Danish is on Top. The British housewife prefers Danish bacon because it is more dependable. Produced from a standardised pig the method of curing is not varied. It is well advertised and pre-

sented to them attractively. These

three attributes practically sum up the qualities English bacon lacks. Denmark produces its bacon from practically one breed of pigs. In England there are ten or more difierent breeds and innumerable crosses. Denmark, by tank curing, produces .a milder cure, more to the general English taste. English curers, as a whole, have been slow to drop the dry salt cure in favour of this method. This heavy-salting, whilst satisfying local tastes of manual workers, is not popular in the cities. English curing is also hampered by a superabundance of curers. Denmark, whose output is almost double that of England, has eighty curing factories. There are between five hundred and six hundred in England, and of these only about forty can be called factories in the full sense.

It would seem to be an insuperable task to standardise the pigs of England, to give the absolutely uniform carcase. New Zealand has a great opportunity, but breed prejudice is blocking the way to progress. There is only room for two breeds of pigs, to provide the desirable first crosses, and if pig breeders could only be made to see this it would be the finest thing that could happen to the country. England is doing something, however, to rectify the curing weakness. Through the Development Board being set up every curing factory will

have to be registered and will have to be up-to-date, and small unnecessary factories will have to be closed.

Baconcrs v. Porkers,

■One of the best informed men on pigs in England is Lord Lymington. Writing in the British Journal of Ag- ; riculture he expresses the opinion that “while pork pigs often fetch, more per score and provide a quicker turnover of cash, to fatten bacon pigs at a reasonable price the year round is more economical.” He adds: “Provided that the last ten weeks in the fattening period of a bacon pig show a profit in pounds weight gained for food and labour, expended, the longer period reduces the rate of cost per pig in overheads for keeping the Isow or paying the initial price -for the stores.”