Hog Wallows—Automatic Dipping Tanks
A wallow is as necessary for a hog as a bath-tub is for a human being. A clean bath benefits the health of a hog, especially if the wallow is filled with a dipping solution. This combination not only saves the lives of fat hogs on hot days, but also aids greatly in preventing cholera. See Dipping Tanks, page 76.
Locate the wallow in a convenient place near the water supply. A level, well drained spot, where the mud will not wash into it, is best. (The wallow [shown in the photograph] is in the hog house, and is a large dish in the concrete floor.) Make the wallow 8 by 12-feet. Dig out the hole with straight sides to the depth of 2 feet 2 inches. Lay a drainage foundation 10 inches thick—see [Sidewalks], page 29. Set a 10-inch board around the outside of the hole to keep the dirt from crumbling in on the concrete.
Mix the concrete 1: 2: 4 and place a 6-inch floor in the hole. As the concrete is laid, embed woven wire in it 1 inch from the bottom. Have the concrete for the side walls fairly dry and tamp it to the shape and dimensions—4 inches thick at the top and 10 inches at the floor line. The sloping sides make cleaning easy. Keep all animals away from the wallow for two weeks. Three men built this wallow easily in one day.
| Materials Required | ||
|---|---|---|
| Screened gravel or crushed rock | 2½ cubic yards @ $1.10 | $2.75 |
| Sand | 1¼ cubic yards @ $1.00 | 1.25 |
| Portland cement | 4½ barrels @ $2.50 | 11.25 |
| $15.25 | ||
A Corn Crib Floor of Concrete
Rats love grain; and therefore the corn crib is usually the rat headquarters of the farm. By building corn cribs and granary floors of concrete the farmer takes a long step toward rat extermination.
Lay out the building: for the foundation wall, dig a trench 12 inches wide and from 2 to 3 feet below ground level. Set box forms, so as to bring the surface of the finished foundation and floor 1½ to 2 feet above ground level, according to the height of the “drag” conveyor used by local corn-shellers.
As the floor will only be 6 inches thick, fill in between the foundation walls with gravel to within a distance of 6 inches of top of forms. Soak this fill thoroughly, and tamp and roll it well, before placing concrete on top.
Mix concrete (1: 2: 4) and fill the foundation forms. Beginning at one end of the building, lay the concrete floor in sections 4 feet wide, and continue until the entire floor is placed.
In order to fasten the wooden sill for the granary uprights to the concrete floor, insert ¾-inch bolts heads down or strap irons bent like capital Z’s at the necessary points in the green concrete of foundation. The bolts are long enough to pass through holes in the sill and to receive nuts and washers. The straps are long enough to be spiked to the uprights.
Finish the surface of the floor with a steel trowel, so as to render scooping of the grain an easy matter.
Approximate cost per square foot of floor surface, 12 cents.
