The Colfax chronicle., 1888-12-01
SOUTHERN AGRICULTURAL.
The OId-Time Way of Raising Sheep.


In the agricultural States, where
land is $50 to 500 per acre. and wool
at the low prices ruling to-day, the old
plan of raising sheep is thing not to
be considered by any thinking man.
Such it was in Illinois forty years ago,
when prices of grain and land were
very cheap. An open prairie afforded
excellent pasturage six months of the
year. The price OF sheep was dol
lar. Wool was for many years so
trifling as to be almost nominal. The
few sheep we sold were cash ar
ticle, as was also the wool 1t
came in as godsend to pay taxes
with in the spring. No business pur-
pose or methods were considered. We
kept sheep as our neighbors kept
flock of geese, "just because some body
else did"
Between the dogs and the hogs, and
lambs coming at any and all times,
freezing in winter in an open yard or
around q straw-stack, and the few
keep our numbers up and have few
whethers to sell each year, and occa-
s:onally mutton for family use.
The mishaps with the lambs and dogs
and hogs were of small moment. In
summer they had no attention unless it
was to salt them. Sometimes when
the dogs were raiding the flocks, they
were hunted up by the children and
penned at night with the COWS as pro-
lection. In the fall the sheep were
taken up and kept at the farms, not al
ways of their owners. They were fed
a half ear Of corn apiece once day,
in some sort of hollow log trough,
and they ran their chances in the
corn-stalk fields and at straw-stacks
with the cattle and colts. They had,
may be, ration of corn-fodder, and, at
rare times, hay or sheaf oats.
At shearing time each farmer got his
own sheep, or balanced with his neigh
Dor in number of fleeces, as all sheep
taken up were wintered. The expense
was tride, and easily arranged be-
tween each other. Two or three dol
lars was a big price for ram; four or
five dollars was proof of insanity-akin
to building sheep-shed, even. There
vas one fact about such business: if
we got one dollar out of sheep or wool
it had not cost us ninety-nine cents.
We considered each dollar we got as
almost a clear one. This was pioneer
sheep-raising.
When we came to using improved
rams and keeping pure-bred focks,
shearing six. eight and ten pounds of
wool in the dirt, we felt that we were
getting about as far along as we had
any right to hope. We had barns and
conveniences that we felt put us at the
top and in front We felt that we had
reached the highest point as sheep
raisers, and had a perfect right to
grow rich. There were none doing
better for their sheep than we were.
If man was making money out of his
sheep, we doubted his veracity or con-
cluded he was taking more pains than
was necessary, and more than we
could. If he paid $25 for ram or
$40 for eve, we said he was foolish,
and would never get his money
back. We ridiculed all improvements
and all progress in breeds and methods
| of management, and decided to stay
where we were and wait for boom to
come; it always came, and we got
ahead some
The few who have managed to make
little money out of sheep every year
have been laughed at for taking so
much pains. Instead of trying to find
out how they did it, some of us have
staid by sheep because others did; be-
cause they used to pay, We think they
must again. Our fathers kept these
same sort of sheep. perhaps, and they
were as good as any body's. We care
for them as well as most of our neigh
bors, and so we are respectable
enough. We can not afford the
outlay for new rams; it will not
pay. We can not see how feeding
fifty-cent corn, thirty-cent oats and
fifteen-dollar hay, and buying wheat
bran or oil-cake to feed, can pay; but
the queer man over the way who does
this claims he has as much money out
OF his sheep as his wheat or cattle.
We do not see how feeding sheep for
mutton can pay. It never seemed to
us sheep wou't fatten in the winter.
Mutton lambs sold pretty we'll, but
they seemed to be lots of trouble. Six
and eight pounds of washed wool to
the fleece was pretty big yarn. We
had as good sheep, and only got three