Feeding to Swine
Most of the smaller cities in this country dispose of a part of or all their garbage by feeding to swine, but so far as the State Bureau of Municipal Information has been able to learn, only four maintain municipal piggeries. These are Worcester, New Haven, Brockton, and Taunton, Massachusetts. The others either collect their garbage by contract and sell it or give it to farmers or those operating piggeries, or maintain a municipal collection and sell to a contractor who maintains a piggery.
Among the cities which dispose of their garbage by feeding to pigs and derive a revenue are the following:
Denver, Colo.—Collected by a Hog Growers’ Association which disposes of it by feeding.
Cambridge, Mass.—Sells to hog farmers at 70¢. per cd. foot and has no difficulty in disposing of all. Cost of collection, $50,000 a year; receipts, $16,000 a year.
Grand Rapids, Mich.—Sold to live stock company for 45¢. per ton f. o. b. cars. Last year collection cost $28,659 and receipts were $4,450.20.
Camden, N. J.—Incinerator burned and since then garbage has been collected and fed to hogs.
Brockton, Mass.—Municipal piggery (description below).
Colorado Springs, Colo.—Contractor pays $1,440 a year for the privilege of removing all table refuse from city. Feeds to hogs. Garbage must be sterilized before feeding.
Salem, Mass.—City Poor Farm uses about 200 loads a year. Remainder is sold to contractor, who pays $13,255 for five years. Last year city paid $10,948.30 for collection.
Taunton, Mass.—Municipal piggery.
Somerville, Mass.—Sold to farmers for 50¢. per cord foot. Cost of collection last year, $25,134.80; receipts, $8,865.50.
Lawrence, Mass.—Sold for $1.25 a load. Ready and increasing demand. Two loads used daily at Poor Farm piggery. Cost of collection, $10,000 a year. Estimated receipts, $6,000 a year.
New Haven, Conn.—Cost of collection, $18,000 a year. Fed to hogs on farm owned by city (description below).
Fall River, Mass.—City pays contractor $7,800 a year for the removal of garbage. He feeds it to pigs on farm owned by him.
Worcester, Mass.—Municipal piggery (description below).
Corning, N. Y.—Contractor pays city $122 a year for privilege of collecting at 10¢. a can. Garbage taken by him to his hog farm.
The city of Brockton, Massachusetts, owns the land and buildings necessary for feeding swine, also the horses and teams necessary for collection. The Mayor’s office reports that the city has not been able to make any profit on this method of disposal. In fact, for the last ten years the average cost to the city has been about $5,000 annually.
Taunton, Massachusetts, collects garbage only in the center of the city. The remainder is taken by private parties. The city has only two teams and two men at work. The Secretary of the Board of Overseers says that “in consequence of doing things in this way it is of little or no expense and gives quite good satisfaction.”
The expense and receipts during one year for the piggery were as follows:
| Wages of employees | $1,299.90 |
| Expenses, not including board of two horses belonging to department | 375.92 |
| $1,675.82 | |
| Receipts from swine | 3,260.91 |
New Haven, Connecticut, pays $18,000 a year for the collection of its garbage, which is hauled to a farm rented by the city and fed to hogs owned by the city. The Board of Health reports: “Outside of some complaints from the piggeries we have got along. Our Board has repeatedly recommended the destruction of the same, but as yet nothing has materialized.”
A special commission made an investigation and report on the collection and disposal of municipal waste in Worcester, Massachusetts. After investigating all methods of disposal it reached these conclusions: “That the disposal by feeding is the most economical method; that the greatest intrinsic value of the garbage, the feeding value, is made use of; that the garbage of Worcester can not only be disposed of without cost but that the revenue from the sale of hogs has almost been sufficient to pay for the collection.”
The Commission recommended that the present method of feeding to swine be continued.
In its report it gives the per capita cost of collection and disposal as $.072 for Worcester and $.095 for Brockton.
The Worcester municipal piggery is the largest and most successful. The garbage collected by the city is fed to a herd of hogs numbering about 1700 in winter and 4000 in summer. During the winter practically all hogs are housed.
The necessity for sterilizing garbage before it is fed to hogs is disputed. Salem, Cambridge, Grand Rapids, Taunton and Brockton report that garbage is not sterilized. New Haven reports that some is sterilized. Colorado Springs and Omaha require all garbage to be sterilized.
In his report of the sanitary survey of St. Joseph, Missouri, J. H. White, Surgeon, United States Public Health Service, makes the following statement with regard to the disposal of garbage in that city:
“Kansas City, Providence, Denver, Omaha, Colorado Springs and other cities have their garbage fed to hogs, with the uniform result that the cost of removal is reduced to some extent to the city and that the contractor, according to his business capacity, is able to make more or less profit from the feed so obtained. There is no danger in this system under proper handling. Any supposed danger to the hogs can be prevented by prompt handling of the garbage to prevent unnecessary fermentation and by the use of the hog cholera serum to prevent disease. The proper cleaning of the pens, if in the city, eliminates any danger to man. The Board recommends this system and I heartily concur with them that it offers the best available solution of the garbage problem.”
The Worcester Commission reports the figures for hogs sold to a packing company during the last year from the Home Farm. Of the 2,276 hogs sold, the Commission says only 11 were condemned by the United States Government Meat Inspectors, an average of only 0.48 per cent. of one per cent., which average is much lower than it is on hogs shipped in from the West to the same packing house. It further says: “The feeding method, however, has been practised with success in many cities, especially those in New England, for many years. The great difference of opinion is explained by the efficiency with which the sanitary conditions at the farm are maintained.” It emphasizes the fact that farms must be kept clean and in a sanitary manner, and that this method of garbage disposal requires careful and intelligent supervision, as is the case with any other method of disposal. No method of disposal will run itself.
Following are comments received regarding this particular plan of disposal:
Health Officer C. C. Slemons, of Grand Rapids, Michigan, says: “From observation I am of the opinion that one of these farms (municipal piggery), properly conducted, is a paying proposition, but I do not think to the extent of paying for collection. From my observation I would be rather skeptical of a city going into this business. It is a business that needs very close supervision and unless a person is financially interested in it I doubt very much if the experiment would pay.”
Mayor Fred. W. Keller, South Bend, Indiana: “Some of this work was done several years ago. However, there was some objection on the part of taxpayers to it being hauled out of the city with municipal teams. It should be fairly profitable, but the farm and hogs should be owned by the city or the garbage disposed of to the concern that does own the hogs and farm and this done by receiving competitive bids. I make this latter suggestion in order to avoid criticism by taxpayers.”
Lawrence, Massachusetts, reports: “Those who have looked into this question contend that the city swill can be utilized to support a municipal piggery at considerable profit.”
In a recent report, the Iowa State College says of this method of disposal: “The only advantage which may be stated in favor of this method is that it probably costs less, under existing conditions about most of our cities, than any other available method.”
In one of its annual reports, the Massachusetts State Board of Health says: “It is objectionable and unsanitary in the extreme, as health authorities are constantly pointing out. Prominent among the objections to this method are the great nuisance it usually creates and the uncertainty of its operation.” The Board says epidemics among pigs create the uncertainty of operation. It also says that they are breeding places for flies and rats.
The Chicago Waste Commission’s comment on this method is that it is not applicable or desirable in a large city, except under inspection and for restricted private collection.
The New York Medical Journal reported that the garbage collected by Grand Rapids, at cost of $26,320, is taken by a contractor who last year paid 45 cents per ton and fed to hogs. It says that over 10,000 hogs are sold yearly at a value of $135,000 and that 2,400 tons of fertilizer are produced at a value of about $36,000.
Samuel A. Greeley, Sanitary Expert, says that 75 pigs are required to dispose of a ton of garbage per day. The equipment at the farm prescribed by him is: Tracks and cars for distributing the garbage along concrete feeding platforms; substantial and well-kept sleeping and warming pens; tanks for sterilizing garbage; apparatus for vaccinating pigs against cholera; a means of disposing of unconsumed garbage by burial or incineration and plenty of washing facilities. He further says: “There should be some method of sorting the garbage before feeding it to pigs so that the stale garbage may be discarded and buried or burned. Some places disinfect it by boiling in large caldrons before feeding. In such cases the cooked garbage is commonly used only as a base for the feed given to pigs. The method is a most profitable one and warrants consideration in small cities where isolated farm sites are available.”