NOTES FOR FARMERS.

Colonist, Volume LI, Issue 12499, 27 March 1909, Page 4

NOTES FOR FARMERS.

VALUE OF PIGS.

At the Aberdeen Agricultural Discussion Society recently, Mr G. A. Biuce, -Inschfield, in an address on Pig Rearing in Aberdeenshire, said the old prejudice supposed to exist in the minds of Scotchmen against the pig had been overcome. The pig was apparently now coming into his own. Referring to the pig census in~ Scotland, which lie said was about three millions, and composed of three or more distinct breeds of pigs, he alluded to the formation of the National Pig Breeders' Association, and went on to consider the practical economy of keeping .pigs.— He considered that few other animals were more profitable, if properly attended to, than the pig . Pigs, he found, had paid him better -than any other kind of stock. He counted on a sow costing about £6 to keep annually, and in return for this she produced two litters of young, which sold in the ordinary market when weaned at about 16s a head. The average income per litter •was about £8, so that the wEble expense of keeping the sow was met by. one of her litters. He expressed the opinion that the chief reason why pigrearing had gone back some time ago was the increased cost of artificial foods' and the high railway rates charged on the transmission" of the animals from one place to another.