The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1890-06-14
FARM AND GARDEN.
THE EARLY LAMBS.
Best Methods of Rearing and Market
ing Them.

Best Methods of Rearing and Market
Ing Them.
The ewes of course have to be served
in warm weather, out of the usual
season for such service. To accomplish
it, they are turned into shady, we'll
watered pasture, and fed light grain
ration daily for two weeks before plac-
ing the ram with them. They are then
kept at good pasture until the approach
of cold weather, when they are placed
in winter quarters and are shorn i'm
mediately. A well-lighted barn base
ment will answer for quarters. This
should be battened or double boarded
on the outside, and lined with sheathing
paper inside. The windows are made
to slide. There is an opening in the
floor above to throw down fodder, and it
also answers as an escape for foul air.
By means of the windows and this
opening, the temperature of the fold can
be kept at the required fifty degree.
The fold is divided into pens 16 feet
square, and these accommodate 16
ewes each, or Ii square feet to eve.
An alley feet wide extends through
the center of the fold. Movable feed
ing racks are the division fences be-
tween the pens. These racks open into
the alley for convenience of filling. The
alley fences are made of boards and are
wired loosely to posts driven in the
ground. Apertures for the egress and
ingress of lambs, but excluding the
ewes, are left between the fences, and
racks and loose troughs are placed in
the alley for the lambs. The pens are
kept we'll bedded, and as they fill up
the racks and fences are raised and held
up by pushing straw under them. If
the surface of the bedding can be kept
dry the manure is not removed while
the sheep remain. When they are gone
the racks and fences can be moved and
vehicle run in to haul ont the manure.
When placed in their quarters, the
ewes should be fed clover hay and corn
fodder in alienation, together with all
the roots they will eat. Their grain
ration now may be barley or oats, but
not corn. After the lambs are dropped,
sweet ensilage may take the place of
roots, and their grain ration from this
time on is whole corn, wheat bran and
Oil meal, mixed in equal proportions by
weight, given twice day, all they will
eat Salt is kept by them, and water in
pals. The lamb troughs are kept sup
piled continually with the same grain
rations. Between four and eight weeks
the lambs should be fat, and weigh thir-
ty-tive to forty pounds live weight, and
are fit for market Poor stock is not
wanted at any price.
Lambs are slaughtered by hanging
them up by the heels and running
knife through the throat crosswise, but
not cutting the cash clear out. The en-
trails only are removed, the TANKS drawn
back and fastened with short skewer,
extending across the back, and the caul
or omentum spread entirely over the
abdominal cavity and all the raw, ex-
posed surface, and fastened there with
short wooden pins. After cooling they
are wrapped in white muslin from the
forward legs to the gambrel joints, and
this is sewed fast with long stitches; a
similar covering of burlaps is placed
over the muslin, and they are then
ready for shipment by express. Most
produce commission houses in large cit
les handle these mbs.-Galen Wilson,
in Country Gentleman.