Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-11-29
ORCHARD AND Farm.
AMERICAN SHEEP INDUsTRY-FARM.
ING AS A BUSINESS.
Cooked Food for Stock in Winter-Prunine
Peach Trees-How to Grow Ounces
General Farm Notes.

No rural industry has been subject to 81
many and such violent fluctuations a
sheep husbandry and wool-grewing. Thes'
vicissitudes have arisen from changes il
the general conditions of agriculture anG
commerce. During the first decade of thu
present century Spanish Merino sheel
were imported IN large numbers, and fount
ready welcome While yielding com
paratively heavy deeces of the most beau
tiful wool in the world, they were found t.
be wonderfully hardy, easily kept ant
adaptable to all manner of climates anc
situations. Every condition was favorabl,
for the success and prosperity of the Me
rino sheep industry. Foreign commerce.
was conducted by slow methods, and O
internal commerce there was scarcely any
in comparison with the present. There
were no swift steamship lines to brine
American wool-growers into sharp compe
tition with those of the antipodes. II
fact, the regions which now support The
countless focks of South America anC
Australasia were inhabited by savages
some of whom feasted upon human fesl
in the absence of mutton. In our owr
country land was either free or held al
merely nominal prices. Under the stimu
lus of such favorable conditions, sheep
raising and wool-growing attained sue
cess and magnitude which promised to be
permanent. Fortunes were made in the
breeding and sale of choice sheep, as well
as the care of focks and the sale of wool
But, as the Eastern and Middle States
were more thickly settled, and the land
advanced in price, while competition with
the cheap land and cheap labor abroad
brought down the price of the staple
wool-growing was found Improbable. II
is needless to go over the details. Nothing
could be more disheartening than the ex.
periences of the flock masters during the
periods of depression which came with
rapid succession. Many focks were
slaughtered and sent to the rendering
kettles for their pelts and tallow. Only
the protection afforded by national law has
preserved any part of our Merino focks
from utter humiliation.
While the fluctuations in the business OF
wool-growing have led alternately to fort,
une and to ruin, the demand for mutton
has steadily increased, and with this in
crease has come steady enhancement in
prices. This has naturally turned the at
tention of enterprising and intelligent
breeders and farmers to the English breeds
of large and heavier sheep than the Me-
rinos So active has been the business OF
importing and breeding these that they
already form an important element in the
farm stock of the country. In three lead
ing breeds of long-wooled sheep, nearly all
the Down breeds, and, more recently, the
horned Dorsets, have become so largely
in this country that each
breed has record society, to secure purity
Of breeding and promote its general sue
cess.
As may well be supposed, many serious
mistakes have been committed by Ameri-
can farmers in changing from the care of
the hardy, gregarious, adaptable Merino
to these heavier sheep, all of which are
the products of very advanced agricult-
ure, and have requirements wholly differ
ent from the others. In Great Britain,
nearly or quite every breed is strictly local,
and the boundaries between their respec-
tive habitats are almost as clearly defined
as the lines of different farms. American
farmers and fiock-masters had not only to
learn the wants and requirements of each
breed, but also to find out by trials what
localities are best adapted to its success.
They had to learn that these English
breeds of sheep could not be pastured in
large fiocks like the Merino. They have
also learned that all the mutton breeds re-
luire an unfailing and abundant supply of
;ucculent and nutritious food. None of
them can, without serious deterioration,
pick living from thin and scant upland
pastures. But they vary greatly from
each other in their req uirements. Lin
coins and Cotswolds will flourish and fat
zen on rich bottom land, while the various
breeds of Downs succeed best on rolling
and clothed with short nutritious grasses.
One great obstacle to success at first was
he lack of root crops to supply the place
If the turnips which formed so large part
If their winter food in England. Ameri-
an farmers have never in general been
,ar.tial 10 root crops. Yet the English
,reeds of sheep can not do we'll on dry
rain and forage in winter without some
lind of succulent food. But Just as this
yant was felt the most clearly, the silo
omes in and supplies a nutritious, succu-
ent material in greater abundance and at
ar less outlay of labor than the same
mount Of root crops corlu be produced
rom the same land.
On the whole, the outlook for the per-
nanent success and prosperity of American
heep husbandry is better than it has been
or many years. The Eastern and Middle
States will continue, with profit, to main
ain stud focks Of choice Merinos to sup
DIV the newer regions with breeding stock.
But farmers and flock masters generally
will find their advantages in keeping sheep
or the two products, wool and mutton
american Agriculturist.
COOKED FOOD FOR STOCK IN WINTER.
That cooked food is more digestible than
hat which is raw is known to be fact, as
cooking breaks the particles, and renders
hem more subject to the action of the gas
.ric Juice of the stomach. But despite the
of this fact by farmers and
others, all experiments made to determine
the advantages of cooking food for stock
have resulted in favor of feeding raw food
IS the more economical method. The
great factor in the cooking of food is the
labor and fuel required, which more than
balances any benefits derived from the les
sening of the quantity of food or its better
when cooked. There are
farmers, however, who cook for stock, and
they claim that ii pays to do SO from an
other standpoint which is that warm food
protects against cold.
The proportion Of the food consumed
that is required to warm the body in cold
weather, before any of the food can be APP
propriated for the production of meat, bone
or milk, is very large, and if the supply of
heat required can be provided in any man
ner except by larger amount Of food it
will be so much saved. No amount of
warm or cooked food will compensate for
inferior food or for imperfect shelter, but
the saving of any portion of the food per-
mits an extra animal to be kent. which is