The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1905-07-29
MORE SHEEP RAISED.

1 AV0G 0k2&A14 41AAASAsDe
| America is becoming yearly more
of a sheep raising and mutton eating
country, writes the Washington cor.
respondent of the Chicago Tribune
This is due primarily to the initiative
of the Department of Agriculture,
which for the last ten years has been
hammering at the farmers to raise
sheep instead of exporting his surplus
grain, and which has helped him in
every way to this end.
One result is that there were report
ed on the first of this year over AS
100000 sheep on the farms and ranch
es of the United States, valued at
$I27. 7.331,S55. as against less than 3d.
100000 in 1899. The receipts of the
Chicago stock yards are reaching up
ward every year since 1894, when the
yards took over million more NUT
ton sheep than in the previous year.
The department is anxious to i'm
presson the farmer the value of sheep
as ont of his farm products, and it
points put that, while the sale of$I,-
900 woth of corn takes from the soil
5000 wo-th of fertility, the farmer
would hive to spend that much in
fertilizers to recoup the land. The
same amount of corn converted into
good muffin and sold at higher
| price than the corn would fetch takes
in the end from the land not over $50
worth of fertility, and if the flock was
kept for woolalone it would not re-
duce the land more then s. or 81.
There is particular interest attach
ing to the sheep raising problem just
now, because the price of mutton is
going up by leaps, not only in the
stores where the consumer has to buy
it, for every one realizes this, but in
Chicago, where lam',s recently have
touched the unprecedented figure of
So per hundredweight, and now are
selling at about $7.25.
During the early days in America
sheep were bred primarily for the
wool and during recent years we have
been importing annually, in addition,
from $25, 5000, 900 to $50, 900, 900
worth of wool But the wool indus
try in this country has come to the
point where it frequently does not
pay to raise the sheep for the fleece
alone. There has, therefore, been an
increasing effort to get good COM
bination breed that would live in large
focks on the range, furnish good
fleece and at the same time be good
mutton sheep.
The farmers of the East still are
confning themselves to the English
breeds of downs and shires, which are
great meat producers, while the West
ern ranches depend largely on the old
Mexican sheep, which is descendant
of the fine merinos imported by the
Spaniards, but which has been affect
ed by environment till it has develop
ed characteristics of its own and is in
a great many respects an ideal sheep
fon,the range.
The f1eec of the Mexican is made
finer and improved by the introdution
of pure merino rams on the range, ,and
when the strain of merino begins to
show too much, making weaker and
more delicate sheep, with fine, silky
wool, the breed is strengthened by the
introduction of some coarser wool
sheep like the Oxfords. So the balance
is maintained.
The department has convinced the
farmer of the value of sheep as one of
his farm products, but is continuing its
educational work, and is anxious to
impress the farmer with the fact that
he still imports over half a million dol.
lars annually of Canadian mutton in
spite of the heavy tariff against it.
The great work that the department
is striving for now is the eradication of
sheep scab, which costs the country
hundreds of thousands of dollars annu-
ally. The department commenced a
crusade in this direction several years
ago.
Up to the present moment there are
two states entirely cleared of scab and
with the right to quarantine against
the rest of the world ,and as soon as the
national government is allowed to go
into the remaining states and terrific
ries the whole country will be cleared
out and the disease, which is the great
est foe the sheep man has to encoun-
ter, will be completely eradicaced.
A good many non-farmers may not
know just what sheep scab is, and for
their benefit it may be well to say that
it is simply sheep parasite that gets
Under the skin and causes the wool to
fall, completely running the fleece and
eventually weakening the sheep till it
dies.
The disease is acutely contagious
and till few years ago had spread
all over the United States without a
check being found for it. Now, thanks
to the departments work, it is known
to be comparatively easily cured, the
sheep being simply dipped in solu-
ton that kills the parasite. Ether,
tobacco and sulphur or lime and sui
phur are used for this, though there
are hundred different "cures" now
On the market.
If THE editor makes a mistake he
has to apologize for it, but if doc
tor makes one the undertaken kindly
buries it for him. If the editor makes
one there is law suit, swearing and