Statement of Supervision and Authorship This bulletin is a report on the results of cooperative soft-pork investigations for a period of five years, from July 1, 1919, to June 30, 1924. The investigations are being continued. The results reported were obtained under the direction of the following: E. Z. RUSSELL, Bureau of Animal Industry. O. G. HANKINS, Bureau of Animal Industry. N. R. ELLIS, Bureau of Animal Industry. J. H. ZELLER, Bureau of Animal Industry. G. L. BURLESON,' Alabama Experiment Station. J. R. QUESENBERRY, Iberia Live Stock Experiment Farm. D. J. GRIS WOLD, Mississippi Experiment Station. G. S. TEMPLETON, Mississippi Experiment Station. E. H. HOSTETLER, North Carolina Experiment Station. G. R. WARREN, Texas Experiment Station. D. W. WILLIAMS, Texas Experiment Station. Credit is due L. W. Himmler1 and H. S. Isbell,1 of the Bureau of Animal Industry, for assistance in the laboratory work, and to K. F. Warner, of the Bureau of Animal Industry, for supervision of the slaughtering at the United States Experiment Farm, Beltsville, Md. By cooperative agreement the results of the investigations are shared jointly and equally by participating institutions. Each cooperating State is authorized also to publish this report in full or in part as a State bulletin with supplementary data, if desired, relative to the local phases of the softpork problem, giving due credit to this publication. 1 Resigned. Data from a few "check" pigs only from the Arkansas and Tennessee stations are included in this bulletin. Both stations, however, have conducted work, furnishing considerable data along other lines which will be reported in subsequent publications. SOME RESULTS OF SOFT-PORK INVESTIGATIONS Prepared by 0. G. HANKINS, Associate Animal Husbandman, and N. R. ELLIS, Associate Biological Chemist, Animal Husbandry Division, Bureau of Animal Industry, in consultation with those named on the preceding page as responsible for the work Much has been said and written with reference to the undesirable characteristics of the products from soft hogs. Generally speaking, their inferiority to the products of firm hogs is recognized. In recent years an effort has been made by some firms, however, to show that certain products from oily 3 hogs, particularly the hams, when cured by special processes, were superior to those from firm hogs (fig. 1). It seems that there is less reason for discrimination against the hams than against any of the other products of soft hogs. The explanation is found in the fact that ordinarily the ham carries a relatively small proportion of fat, in which the softness lies. Green hams constitute, however, only about 18 per cent of the weight of the dressed carcass. The bacon, shoulders, loins, lard, and sausage re Oily hogs differ from soft hogs only in degree of softness. The oily class is the softest in the scale of physical grades. 1 |