tle variation in
the management of pigs. One of the common mistakes made by farmers is to
neglect their pigs in the autumn, at the very season when a little extra
food is needed, and for which the pigs will give a better return than at
almost any time of the year. The early portion of October is one of the
best periods for mating the sows, the yelts may be left until the latter
part of the month so that their pigs do not arrive until the month of
February when the days are lengthening and the sun has more power. It is
advisable to have many of the fat pigs ready for market ere the month of
November ends, as the demand for pork is usually slack for two or three
weeks prior to and after Christmas.

CHAPTER XVII

DISEASES OF THE PIG

Fortunately, the pig is subject to comparatively few serious
diseases--save swine fever, swine erysipelas, and very occasionally
anthrax, which are contagious or infectious, and all in the special
charts of the veterinary department of the Board of Agriculture, and
within the contagious Diseases Animals Acts. Prior to the stamping out
of Foot and Mouth Disease or apthous fever and rabies, pigs suffered
from these contagious and infectious diseases, particularly the former
of the two, which caused immense losses, especially of young pigs,
during the latter half of the past century.

Of the other ailments to which pig flesh is heir, the majority and the
chief of them are mainly due to that want of knowledge or care in the
feeding and in the housing of the pigs which renders them more
susceptible to the sudden changes in the temperature or to the
inclemency of the season. In former chapters some, if not all, of these
ailments have been referred to, but it may be more convenient to our
readers to include in one chapter a brief description of the ailments
and the remedies and means of prevention.

SWINE FEVER

Some thirty years since the losses from this disease were of so serious
a nature that the Board of Agriculture determined to attempt to stamp it
out, as they had succeeded in stamping out pleura pneumonia in cattle,
and foot and mouth disease. The success of their efforts was not at all
commensurate with the outlay. The failure was attributed to many causes;
amongst them the want of a complete knowledge of the disease, the
impossibility of diagnosing it during the life of the patient, the
absence of sympathy on the part of the local veterinary surgeons owing
to certain steps