Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-02-11
THE SHEEP INDUSTRY.

Mr.. r. NJ. Bell, the noted sheep authority,
a letter from whom appeared in the GA
zETTE two weeks ago, and who favors US
with another letter to-day, says in his
American Grange Bulletin, that it requires
just as much Judgment skill and industry
to be a successful sheep breeder, sheep
feeder, mutton raiser, spring lamb raiser
and wool grower as it does to be success
full manufacturer, merchant, mechanic or
professional man. If the manufacturer or
merchant ran business on the uncertain
shit or miss" methods that the sheep
raiser too often does there would be a
financial crash in this country within ninety
days.
It seems to be quite generally claimed
that sheep-raising has not been well pay
ing business of late years, but who knows
Not so much as one in ten of all our sheep
men can tell whether the business has paid
or not. No account has been kept with the
flock. How would merchant come out on
such a system One thing is sure: the few
men who have been successful in sheep dur
ing the last seven years have been close
fgurers, and on this account, didn't do any
thing that did not pay.
We may add that this same kind of thing
works as well for all branches of agriculture
as for sheep husbaudry. More than half
the agricultural depression that we hear
about springs from the fact that farmers do
not correctly inform themselves relative to
what they are doing financially It is never
safe to run any branch of business on the
''blind" plan, and trust to the pocket-book
to show whether or not that business has
paid. We must know from an array of
plain figures that it has paid. If the figures
show that it has not paid, then we must
drop that particular line of farming and
adopt some other line for our moneyed crop.
Not few things pay that we think are
not paying, owing to the fact that we have
not kept accounts. We refer to the pocket
book and find it empty, but do not always
have the figures at hand to show what
emptied it. Possibly it has paid Us good
per cent but we have somehow managed to
get away with that good per cent, just as
men in other lines of business often do
Before we can justly conclude that our
performance has resulted in failure we
must be able to see where the money has
gone. When we are able to do this, and
still find that our operations with certain
line of products have fell short of paying a
fair per cent on the cost of production, then
as already intimated, it is cur duty to
change to something else. Nothing should
be followed that does not pay. If all
farmers would make it their invariable
rule to keep strict accounts. they would
soon be able to set themselves on footing
that would make agriculture paying bust
ness every time, so far as related to the
business. OF course this is not presuming
that all farmers would get rich, for there
are some men who would not get rich no
matter what they were engaged at, but it
would enable them to do well, if they de-
sired to do wen, and would forever set at
rest the charge of failure tc pay thrown
against the line of business IN which they
were concerned.
We contend that farming does pay if well
conducted. Every line of farming might
not be made to pay by every farmer, but
there are lines enough to enable every
farmer to find one that would pay him II
properly managed. How can he find the
paying line unless he is able to put his
finger upon figures showing costs and
profits!
Piesse understand that this is referring