Page:The Hog.djvu/185

183 state; they are either roasted in an oven or macerated in boiling water. The same reason may be given here as will apply to all kinds of roots and fruits, not only when used as food for swine, but also for other animals, and even for the human being; they are rendered more digestible by cooking, divested of their crudeness, and thus better calculated to nourish the system without fatiguing or disordering its powers. Besides which there is a decided saving effected. Some even go so far as to calculate that cooked, or ground, or bruised food, goes as far again as that which is given in its natural state or merely cut up.

In America, where there is an abundance of apples and pumpkins, these fruits are given to swine: we quote an account related by a great breeder of these animals, who attaches much value to these two articles of food, which seems to testify their utility:—

"On the 10th of October twenty swine were put up to fatten, all of which were only in middling store order, in consequence of the scarcity of feed. The cows producing very little wash from the dairy, and the crop of apples being scanty this season, nothing had been given them during summer but a small orchard containing one acre and a-half of land (with the premature apples which fell,) in which was a pond of water, a very essential requisite to hogs, and one to which, under the powerful influence of the sun, they will resort for their chief comfort.

"The above twenty swine were divided into three lots and closely confined; we proceeded to fatten them by steaming 4 bushels of small potatoes, 12 bushels of apple pomace, 4 bushels of pumpkins, and 1 cwt. of buckwheat cornel, adding a little salt, the whole being well incorporated together while hot from the steamer, with a wooden pounder, and suffered to undergo fermentation before it was used as food: they were at the same time supplied with plenty of charcoal and pure water. While feeding them with the first steamer of the compound, a more than ordinary moisture was observed on their litter, which was occasioned by urine: a knowledge of animal nature convinced the owner that any more than an ordinary flow would weaken the system, and retard the progress of fattening; and he attributed this evil to the steamed pumpkins acting as a diuretic, stimulating the kidneys and increasing the evacuation of urine.

In the next steamer, therefore, 4 bushels of ruta-baga were substituted for the pumpkins, which had the desired effect. This experiment afforded proof that a mixture thus compounded contains a large mass of nutritive material ready prepared for the action of the stomach, and therefore producing flesh more rapidly than any other combination of food made use of. All the waste apples being used up, and there being a greater quantity of soft corn on hand than usual, that was given to the hogs, but instead of their condition improving they fell off, and the owner was under the