Mimeo No. 36	September 17, 1948
Dept. of Animal Husbandry in Cooperation with Agronomy Department
EMERGENCY PASTURE SYSTEMS FOR HOGS C. H. Vestal and G. O. Mott

There is need for better pasture systems in swine production.  This need is greatest when the rotation pastures, especially alfalfa and clover, are not available. Most good pasture systems for corn belt farms include alfalfa, red clover* ladino clover, or pasture combinations including these legumes, in adequate amounts for the hogs produced and fed on the farm* However* seeding failures, drought or winter killing of these crops often make the sowing of emergency pasture crops necessary for adequate grazing*
A usual recommendation for emergency pasture is oats and rape for late spring and early summer, followed by sudan grass during lace summer and early fall; continuing on the sudan grass through a dry fall, or changing bad, to rape when it is revived by fall rains.
  An experiment was conducted during the summer of 1948 to compare alfalfa and these «ertoency pasture crops as all-summer pastures for growing and fattening hogs*
nighty spring pigs with an average starting aeight of 40 pounds were divided into two lots and fed from Jun 16 to oeptauber 8 to compare the pastures^ The pigs in ea h lot had a free-choice -atio' cf shelled com, protein supplement composed of equal parts soybean oil meal and meat and bore scraps, mineral mixture, and salt* Lot 1 had oahr !and rape pasture during the first sic weeks, and sudan grass the lash six weeks, of the 8Way grazing period,, Lot 2 remained on alfalfa pasture througnout the experiment0 The oats and rape er so’wn together at the rate of five pounds of rape and one ad one-half bushels of oats per acre* The sudan grass seed was broadcast, 30 pounds ?er acre.
The weather was favorable growing the crops and the pigs had ample pasture of tood quality at all times*
The tables which folio- who* the results of the different feeding penocs and for le entire experiment,

 Purdue University
Agricultural Experiment Station Lafayette, Indiana