The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-09-17
What One Has Been Do
ing With Merinos.
Ye Who SILVER Tor Lack of Wool, and
Ye Whose Mouths Water for Nut.
ton. Should Read This
Article.

profitable it would be for them if more
sheep We're kept. They have told what
a profitable business it is in the North,
and especially in the West. They have
generally been told to commence with
the common ewes and cross them
with blooded South Down or ShrOp-
shire, or Cotowold, mainly to get NUT
ton sheep, as the first great aim in
sheep husbandry is mutton.
Now the people, with one eXcep-
ton and that is in Texas. have been
trying the buSinesS in this way for
more than one hundred years and
large f1ocks kept for wool as the main
purpose have not been kept except
in Texas, and as a result there is prac-
tically no sheep husbandry in the
South. while IN the West there are
tens of thousands of them.
1t is a historical fact that MerinOs
have been the great pioneer sheep Of
the world and have mainly been the
foundation of sheep husbandry in all
countries where that business is large
~ followed now or has been within
the last one hundred years. / be-
| lieVe they would be successful in the
South even when brought and kept
in large fiocks So in this idea we
brought 200 thoroughbred registered
MeIlllO ewes anu LII eS SlOCh lI'Ih9
from Northern Illinois at cost of
nearly $4,000 to Statesville,: n. c.,
which is low down in the Piedmont
region where cotton is successfully
grown. That it may be known that
these are of the highest class Merinos
for wool | will say they averaged 10
to u pounds annually of wool and
stock rams &c to 80 pounds, all of
which has been sold to the Chatham
Manufacturing Company at Elkin, n.
c., at from IS to % cents per pound,
and this year, for some of the clip
known as Delaine wool, they paid US
25 cents per pound. Several ewes have
shorn as high as Is pounds in one
year. The wool has brought US an
average of from $2.25 to $2.G5 per
head.
Ny observation of this business in
life and experience with these sheep
here is that 81 per head annual in
come will be ample pay for keeping
MerinO sheep, so that the shepherd
has more than the increase of the
flock for clear profit and he is not do
ing his part by the sheep at all if
his clear profit does not amount to at
least 35 per cent on his investment,
and it may be made so to rs per cent.
Besides all this these sheep kept in
fine condition are worth $3.50 per
head for their manure as fertilizer
on the farm.
These sheep of ours have met about
every adverse as we'll as favorable
conditions they would be confronted
with in the South except that of tide
water and overflow districts.
We find that pea vine hay and fod-
der, corn fed i'm sufficient quantity.
clean and dry and without any mold
is surely good enough roughness; $50
to 200 pounds of well balanced
ration made up from corn, wheat bran,
cotton seed meal, oats and peas, fed
to each full grown sheep per annum
say one-fourth pound per day dur
ing six months summer and three
fourths pound per day during balance
of the year, is ample grain feed. One
should provide abundance of rye, VIM
ter oats and rape soWn in August or
early September, for fall, winter and
spring grazing up to the first of May
and thus lower the cost of keeping
the sheep at least 33 per cent, besides
adding to their health, comfort and
fleece
Briefly, will say that / believe the
practicabiity of successful sheep hus-
bandry in the South, with wool as
a first consideration and mutton sec
ondary has been proved with these
fiocks in North Carolina. 1t is no lon
ger an experiment. The South is not
undeveloped wilderness nor is its own
ers an uneducated people, largely fg-
norant of stock keeping, agricultural
or general industrial persuits, but
they are intelligent, Industrious, and
possess large common sense in gen.
eral industry therefore to establish
sheep husbandry with them does not
require fifteen to twenty-five years
nd, i'm wit n T.
worthless scrubs for a foundation that
shall be bred up to usefulness as was
the proper method so largely in the
West. The South is now fit in condi-
ton and intelligence to profit by
Western and Northern experience and
to get and succeed with fairly good
sheep as a foundation sheep. For
wool as a prerequisite and mutton as
a secondary or following consideration
is the early history of sheep hus-
bandry in the North and the West; so
1 must say, commence with a heavy
fleeced fine wool sheep which can
be had at quite a low price. not ANY
old thing" from the WOOdS-but at
least of fairly good qualities as the
foundation for Southern flocks and
with enough of them in each flock
to pay the owners from the start to
give them the benefit of the intelli-
gent industrial management that our
people now possess and which needs
no other teacher than is afforded in
sheep books and agricultural papers.
July 10th. the New York market
quoted So to 60 cents per pound; Ken
lucky lambs, to months old, at
$3.50 to 1910 and 70 to 50 cents per
pound; Western lambs, 6 to II months
old. at $3.50 to $40 per hundred
pounds. The latter is the kind the
South should be producin" now by
the hundred thousand. Il
We found that want of fencing and
negligence in use of internal worm
antidotes was the two great adverse
things to the KEEPING of sheep here,
so the industrious and vigilant use
of both these things will make it easy
to overcome all other and less adverse
things to the business in North Caro- |
lima and in the South.
1t is an exploded old imperial coun-
try idea that a fine wool heavy fleece |
can not be grown on a mutton body
nor in a Southern State. 1t is being
done now by the thousand with Me-
rino sheep in the North and West,
where the Merino and grade Merino
calling a.