D2-Lancastor Farming Saturday, Juna 27,1987
Variety Is The Spice
BY BARBARA MILLER
Lycoming Co. Correspondent
DUSHORE - Whether you
drizzle maple syrup on your
pancakes in the morning, broil a
lamb chop for supper, or snack on
potato chips later, there is a
chance the Voughts of Sullivan
County had a hand in it. On their
350 acre century farm, three
generations of Voughts grow
potatoes for Wise Potato Chips,
Berwick, run a sizable maple
syrup operation, keep a flock of 120
ewes and lambs, and shear sheep
in a three-county area. In addition
they do a bit of crop farming and
run a small beef operation.
According to 78-year-old David
Heat and Hogs
If you gave a pig his choice of
environments around the world, he
would probably settle in a warm or
tropical location. That’s where
people found pigs when the first
hog farms were invented 7000
years ago. And even the wild pigs
of today seem to roam in the
warmer climates.
Then why does a 400-pound sow,
or for that matter a 200-pound hog,
have such a miserable time when
temperatures reach the 90s? Have
we changed hogs that drastically
m the last 70 centuries? No. But
we’ve changed their surroundings -
- so much that pigs in a typical
confinement building are at your
mercy to stay comfortable.
In a confinement building, when
the temperature is too high, the pig
usually finds a wet spot in the pen.
If there is none, the best he can do
is lie on his side and pant. When
that happens, it’s costing you
money.
Effects of Heat
on Growing-Finishing
Hogs
High temperatures take their toll
on hog performance. Studies at
Nebraska and Kansas State show
that high temperatures cause hogs
to eat less feed, and grow more
slowly and less efficiently. For
example, in a 95-degree en
vironment, gains were cut by more
than half and hogs needed an extra
two pounds of feed to make a pound
of gain, compared to those housed
at 68 degrees.
If performance were gouged that
severely for just two weeks, it
would add eight days to the time to
market and an extra 24 pounds of
feed per head. For many
producers, that would cost more
than |2 a hog.
Effects of Heat
on Replacement Gilts
A study at Missouri compared 60
and 90 degree temperatures for
replacement gilts. Only 20 percent
of the gilts in the high tenlperature
group were in heat by 230 days of
Vought, third generation of
Voughts to own the farm since
1850, diversification has been
characteristic of their family for
quite some tune.
“We were married during the
depression and you had to do
anything you could to get a dollar
to live on,” David recalls.
Although the Voughts have
always farmed, made maple syrup
for at least their own use, and kept
sheep, David recalls that for a time
he had a dairy herd and over the
years he hauled milk, whitewashed
bams, and among other things
even hauled coal to make ends
meet. “I don’t how we got it all in,”
he reflects.
Pork
Prose
by .
Kenneth B. Kephart
Penn State Extension Swine Speciabst
age, compared to 90 percent of
those housed in moderate tem
peratures. The 90 degree heat also
caused an increase in water intake
from 1.3 gallons to 4.3 gallons per
head per day and a jump in
respiratory rate from 35 to 111
breaths per minute. (Normal
respiration rate for hogs and sows
is 15 to 35 per minute. A respiration
rate over 50 is a sign of heat
stress.)
Effects of Heat
on Sows
Sows, like hogs, lose their ap
petite when the temperature soars.
In a Texas Tech study, sows
housed at 59 degrees ate about 14
pounds of feed per day during
lactation. At 90 degrees, sows cut
feed intake by 3 1/2 pounds and
lactational weight losses climbed
from 4 pounds to 47 pounds.
In a Kansas State study, lac
tating sows housed in 87-degree
heat increased their daily feed
intake by two pounds when they
were housed under drip coolers.
That translated into a 12 pound
heavier litter weight at weaning.
When hot weather comes late in
gestation and through the
farrowing period it increases
farrowing time. That can smother
piglets since their umbilical cords
often break before they reach the
end of the birth canal. Studies at
Nebraska show that 100-degree
temperatures can boost the
stillborn rate to more than 5 pigs
per litter.
Effects of Heat
on Boars
Most producers know the harm
ful effects of high temperatures on
boars. Sex drive goes down.
Semen volume drops. And under
certain conditions, sperm fertility
can drop to zero. The fertility isn’t
affected for five or six weeks,
often after the hot weather (or
fever) is past. Effects are worse
when the nights don’t cool down -
(Turn to Page D 3)
Of Farm Lif
David says he still does a lot of
plowing, discing and dragging the
fields although he takes time off to
enjoy a tnp to Canada now and
then.
Potatoes, which the Voughts
have been raising commercially
for the past 45 to 50 years, ac
cording to Harvey, David’s son,
are their main crop. Each year, he
says, they plant 50 acres of
potatoes and harvest about 10,000
hundredweight, or 500 to 600 tons,
which are sold to Wise Potato Chip
Co., Berwick.
Two trailer loads of Kennebec,
Norchip and an unnamed variety
of potatoes are received each
spring by the Voughts to be used as
seed. These varieties, Harvey says
are “dry potatoes.”
“When potatoes are in cold
storage some of the starch turns to
sugar which burns and makes the
potato chips dark,” explains
Harvey. With the varieties listed
above, he says, less of the starch
turns to sugar, making them much
better suited for potato chips.
Further, he says, when potatoes
are to be used for chips they are
kept at a temperature of 50 degrees
which keeps the starch from
turning to sugar. Whereas potatoes
destined for ordinary consumption
are stored at temperatures of 38 to
I 40 degrees to help prevent
1 sprouting.
Before planting begins around
the middle of May, the potatoes are
I put through a machine which cuts
, them into smaller pieces for
j planting. The machine grades
' them according to size and then
- cuts the larger ones into four
pieces and halves the smaller ones
before they are planted by
machine.
1 Besides specifying certain
varieties and special storage
’ procedures, Harvey says, Wise’s
also requires that the potatoes
should be 1-7/8 inches to 4 inches
long and weigh no more than one
pound with no less than 15 percent
being number-one potatoes.
Around the beginning of Sep
tember, Harvey reports, they
begin picking potatoes by hand.
Although they tried harvesting
them by machine, they found with
the stones in their soil it didn’t
work very well, and they returned
to harvesting the potatoes by hand.
The Voughts store their potatoes
in a new 120-by-30-foot-wide
structure constructed August 1986
to replace one lost in a fire the
previous January. The new
building features nine inches of
Fiberglass and two inches of
styrofoam insulation on the
sidewalls plus twelve inches of
fiberglass on the ceiling.
Despite this, Harvey reports,
that last year they lost some
potatoes in storage. He thinks a
change in the varieties they grow
will correct the problem this year.
The Voughts’ potatoes are
marketed from November through
February. Harvey adds that Wise
uses several different varieties,
buying potatoes from all over the
country throughout the year. “Our
little crop wouldn’t last them a
day,” he observes.
Each year in March, two months
before they start planting potatoes
the Vought family, including
cousins and other relatives,
congregates a short distance from
their homestead at the maple
sugar shed. There they continue
what has always been a Vought
rite of spring, the making of maple
syrup.
Originally, Harvey says, his
ancestors made enough maple
syrup for their own use to be used
as a sweetener. But over the years
they increased the size of their
operation until today they average
450 gallons of syrup per season.
“Everybody erijoys making
syrup,” Harvey says, “You always
know spring is coming Dad has
(Turn to Page D 4)
Vought family. Here David and his grandson Carl show some
ewes and lambs. The flock totals about 120.
Carl displays one of his Rambouiltet rams