Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 155, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 June 1916 — BENEFITS OF EXTENSIVE, INTENSIVE AND PRETENSIVE PLANS OF FARMING [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

BENEFITS OF EXTENSIVE, INTENSIVE AND PRETENSIVE PLANS OF FARMING

Former Newspaper Reporter, Now Operating Farm Near Springfield, 0., Relates Graphic Story of His Early Start and of the Trials and Tribulations Which Ultimately Lead to Suc-cess-Successful Improvement of Live Stock Based on Principles of Heredity.

<By Q. H. ALFORD, State Farm Demonstration Agent, Maryland.) Riverdale farm, near Springfield, 0., comprises 364 acres In two sections, •one of 256 acres and the other of 98. This being a river bottom farm, and •one peculiarly adapted to the growing of corn and alfalfa, these are the chief field crops. The schedule for 1916 calls for 168 «cres of corn, 60 acres of alfalfa, 30 acres of oats Beeded to alslke and 16 Acres of barley seeded to alfalfa. The remainder of the land Is utilized for permanent pasture, buildings, lots, gardens, etc. Thirty acres of the corn is raised on shares by farmers living nearby. The balance of the regular work Is-done by the hired men. Mr. Robbins normally employs two to three men during December, Janu-

ary and February, and five the rest of the year, not including threshers, corn cutters and huskers. Cost of Labor. To the regular farm help he pays more than the usual wages, but is careful to employ only the best men obtainable. His cash cost as shown by the pay roll averages only 14% cents per hour of labor. The actual cost Is always over 20 cents, the difference being taken up by house rent, milk, garden, meat, potatoes and other perquisites allowed to employees. In making advance estimates on work to be done, or the saving that may be accomplished by the installing of new devices and methods, he uses 25 cents per hour of labor as the basis figuring. He considers It to be one of the privileges of operating a farm, that the boss is able to keep in close touch with the individual men who work with him. It Is his observation that If a man does his work right and is paid fairly, he and his family live rightly. Right living is the most that there is to life anyway. He firmly believes that men who are employing as many workers as they can, teaching them to accomplish as much as possible, and treating them fairly, are each and everyone doing more for humanity than all of the fool agitation and misguided legislation in the world combined. Interesting Statement. The following is a very interesting statement by Mr. William H. Robbins, the owner: “It has been said that there are three kinds of farming: extensive, intensive and pretensive. All three have their advantages and I am inclined to the belief that the greatest appertain to agriculture of the pretensive variety. There is nothing that I would like better than to be able to run a model farm and not have to make it pay. “Probably the less said regarding my earlier career as a farmer the better. My father presented me with a part of what is now Riverdale farm

when I was nineteen years old. I did not want it> What I did want was to continue working at reporting, which had been my Job for over a year. However, he rather adroitly got me to promise to give up the newspaper work and handed me the farm at the gametime. I found after I started in that nt~-was a good deal like being pushed dock and told to learn to swim. His First Venture. "My first venture was a trip through lowa buying stock cattle. It was a sad experience, and one that I cannot think of to this day without a feeling of deep pain. What they did to me was certainly a plenty. However, I learned several things, among them how* to tell the difference between steers and heifers.

“There is considerable misunderstanding on the part of the general public regarding purebred cattle. It is hot unusual for a customer to say to us that he Is raising hogs for pork and does not want fancy stock. This is an appellation that I detest. I consider that there is no such term as “fancy stock," or at least that such a term cannot be rightly applied to our farm animals. Good Points es Hog. “It might seem to some that the eyes, ears, feet and coat of a hog were fancy points, since they have no place in the pork barrel which is his ultimate end. However, a good and comparatively large eye 1b almost invariably accompanied by a good disposition, and good eyesight is essential, especially to the brood sow in caring

for her litter. For this reason, we do not want the ear of the hog to cover the eye so as to interfere with the vision. Likewise the fact that a hog’s ears are muscqlarly well under its control is, to my mind, an indication of a well-balanced nervous organization. Good hearing is in itself necessary to the efficient brood sow, for if she inadvertently lies down on a pig, she will get up at once when Bhe hears him squeal. It is also convenient to have hogs come when they are called. Regarding the feet, the hog that has good strong pasterns and is right up on his toes will willingly take the exercise which is necessary to his health, while a hog with weak pasterns will not. Also, the feet are an indication of the quality of the entire hog. It is difficult to clean properly the carcass of a curly-coated hog, curly coats showing under the microscope the corollary characteristic of viciously barbed roots. This last is a fact not generally known to hog men, and is by way of being a trade Becret of one of the Chicago packing houses which saves money by discriminating in favor of smooth-coated hogs. I merely mention these minor matters in a general way. At first thought they might be termed fancy, but they are not. “I want to differentiate between animal breeding as it is generally understood, even by many so-called breeders, and what I term constructive or statistical breeding as it is practiced by us. Improvement of Stock. “Successful improvement of live stock is based on distinct principles of heredity, several of which I will mention in passing, without taking up the known and speculative biological reasons for them, or going into their discovery, which is exceedingly interesting and romantic. “First, wfe have the principle of variation, which is that in the mating of animals, of dissimilar characteristics some of these will appear in a part of the offspring, and others will appear in

the rest, so that a breeder can, in successive generations* retain those characters which are desirable and discard the undesirable. “Second, the principle that like produces like, whereby man is enabled to mate, animals of similar characteristics with a fair assurance of perpetuating future generations. “The two foregoing principles are simple in their conception and easily understood, but the practical application is quite complicated, and you will find that they are utilized by men who buy and mate even high-class animals and sell the produce. They are, not constructive breeders because they never get beyond their starting point. "Third, we have mutation, which is the appearance of an entirely new hereditary character, and is not to be ♦ •' v- »

confused with atavism, or the reappearance of a characteristic once dominant in the ancestry, but for several generations recessive or dormant. "In 1904 we started with a herd of Duroc brood sows. By 1907 we had re> placed our grade herd with the progeny of these. Our present herd consists of 65 registered sows, with a normal annual production of about seven hundred pigs, all eligible to record. "Each brood sow in the herd has a number. For identification purposes an aluminum band, stamped with her number, is placed in each of her ears. These seldom have to be referred to, but they are there If we want them, and make our breeding operations independent of any one man, including myself. “A carefully tabulated record is kept of the conformation of every animal in the breeding herd, covering in all over thirty physical characteristics. “Before the breeding season each sow is listed on a separate form in a loose-leaf book. This form is designed for the keeping of a complete record of the sow and her litter from the time she is bred until her pigs are weaned. “Her name, age and herd number are entered, together with the date of listing, and her weight and condition at that time. Then, after careful consideration of her pedigree, conformation and the results of previous matings, we decide to what boar she shall be bred. This is indicated on the form, and also a second choice if deemed advisable. Subsequently the date of breeding is recorded. Acts as Daily Tickler.

“After the sows are all bred and safe in pig the pages of the loose-leaf book, which have heretofore been in numerical order, are rearranged chronologically with reference to the dates on which the sows are due to farrow. It then acts as a daily tickler as to when we may expect litters, when we shall mark pigs, when turn them out and when to wean them, etc. “Just before the sow farrows, her weight is again entered. We are thus able to tell just which sow gains the best on a given amount of feed. We keep our sows gaining an average of a pound a day each during the 112 to 118 days of gestation. We can accomplish this by proportioning the amount of feed to the weight of the sows, which are carried in bunches of about twenty. However, there is a considerable variation in individual gains. Of course, the sows lose in weight at farrowing and during the time they suckle their pigs. "There is always an attendant with the sow when she farrows, which is frequently at night. All circumstances are noted, especially the number of pigs, and how many, if any, are farrowed weak or dead. The pigs are weighed when they are one week old, at itfhich time they are also marked. We mark each pig by punching and nicking the ears in such a way that we can read the number of his dam almost as easily as if it were branded on his side. A nick at the root of the right ear means one, at the middle two, at the outside tip three, at the inside tip four, and a hole punched in the center five. A combination of the hole (5) and any one nick (1, 2, 3

or 4) means six, seven, eight or nine. By using this same system for tens in the left ear, as well as for digits in the right, we can get any number to one hundred without having more than two marks in each ear. System of Marking. “This is our own system of marking, and I believe is the only one that limits the number of marks in an ear to two and does away with the necessity of referring to a key. It is not necessary to identify pigs otherwise than with the number of the dam up to the time they come to breeding age. “A history of the litter as such is kept up to the time the pigs are eight weeks old, when they are weaned, particular attention being paid to trouble or losses of any sort. There are about a thousand and one things that can adversely affect a pig. and the elimination of these requires constant study. “At weaning each individual pig is weighed, as well as the sow. The conformation of each pig is tabulated on the attendants' record, and a score Is given to the litter. “We replace about one-fourth of our herd each year with younger animals, and it matters not how much we may think of a sow, she goes to the butcher if her production record puts her in the chute list. “While this is useful in eliminating the least profitable breeding animals, its greatest value to hs lies in its application to the scientific study of pedigrees in the selection of those that replace them.”

Filling Automatic Waterer From Road.

Fall Pigs at Self-Feeders.

Royal E. Nuff.