The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1878-06-27
Gle Farm.
Practicable Essay on Sheep
HuSbandry.

ItSI OllcC ds " mo
business:
| will in my humble way give my
experience. | commenced with a
lot of twelve pure CotswOld ewes IN
1870, and treated them in the fol-
lowing amer will commence
with the breeding first. | put the
buck with the ewes the first OF Dc
tober. 1t is five months from the
time the ewes are bred until they
drop their lambs. Soyou will have
no lambs before the lst of March.
1t will take about SIX weeks for the
ewes to get through lambing-by
that time the grass has commenced
growing and the ewes don't get
poor and the lambs don't get stunt
ed from bad weather. 1t Is very
necessary that the ewes should be
housed during the time of their
lambing.
| should have stated before that
thirty or forty ewes are enough for
one buck.
| feed my ewes corn and shock
fodder, and furnish them all the
fodder they can eat; also give them
from two to three ears of corn a
day, as well as good range and free
dom from other stock.
The health of the sheep is the
next thing to observe. l give my
sheep rosin and sulphur in salt and
meal, which seems to be of great
benefit to them.
A breeding buck should be two
wears old and over to produce good
strong lambs. Much depends OF
the constitution of the buck in the
success of sheep raising. Always
select the most masculine appear
ance. Every observer of the sheep
has seen bucks that wore the ap-
pearance very much of eyes; such
should be avoided.
AS a breeder, | never breed in
and-in. | think the laws of nature
are against 1T.
Cotswold sheep are not as prolific
as many other breeds. They re-
quire more attention than other
breeds, but they will pay for all the
extra attention.
l will now give you the amount
realized from my twelve ewes in
five years. Seven hundred and
thirty-eight dollars besides sixteen
eve left, and also some wool used
at heme every year.
| lose some of my lambs every
year. The yield of wool averages
from ten to fourteen pounds, though
l have clipped as high as eighteen
and twenty pounds from some of
my sheep.
The Cotswold sheep is very gen.
tie, and not inclined to rogue like
some other breeds.
An ordinary farmer with two or
three hundred acres of land, can
make it very profitable to keep
from thirty to fifty head of Cots
void sheep. They do not do well in
larger numbers together.
What | have said is for the con-
sideration of the smaller farmers
who aim to keep from thirty to
fifty. | will now speak of the more
m class or scrubs. My expe-
rience with them has been ve,y salts
factory as to profit. have for sever
al years been raising scrub sheep.
| breed ewes to a pure Cotswold
buck and the produce is fine, large
mutton lamb, which will bring
from three and a half to four dol
lars. | will give you the actual
weight of a lot of two hundred
lambs weighed at different times
from the eighth of June to the
twenty-sixth of August. The first
eighty head, Sth of June, seventy
four pounds; forty head, 18th day
OF July, seventy-six pounds; eighty
the remainder, eighty-three pounds,
goth day of August. The average
weight of the lot, seventy-seven
pounds and a quarter. They were
the product of two hundred and
fifty ewes-that sold at three and a
half dollars per head. The ewes
on the 1st day of December weigh
ed ni~nety-two pounds; SO you very
readily see the lambs must have
improved very much over the ewes
from only one cross to a good buck.
| don't make it a rule to house
the ewes regularly, but if a eve
has a lamb in bad weather | shell
ter her. A very good place for
ewes to lamb is in a meadow,
around a haystack. The stack:
serve as a protection from the
weather.
l will here give you the result o.
three hundred and twenty-eigh1
sheep bought the Sth of Septembe1
and sold in n year from the time
OF purchase. Cost nine hundred
and SIytu 1o1larc Tho wno1 onf