The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1914-06-23
SHEEP HUSBANDRY A GROWING
INDUSTRY IN NORTH CAROLINA
Great Quantity of Waste Land Available a Special Facility
and One That Many States No Longer ~Enjoy-Sheep
Breeders Organized

and at the factories instead of food
for sheep. SO the sheep moved west
ward into Pennsylvania and OHIO.
Thirty or forty years & the hills OF
western Pennsylvania and Ohio were
covered with millions of sheep. Con-
gress was beSieged at every session for
wool tariffs to sustain the baa-baaS
of those woody districts hat sent rep
resentatives down to Washington with
the one idea of pleading for sheep and
James c.. Blaine, a Western
vanian by birth, stood as the apostle
Of the tariff On wool. "A cheap coat
makes a cheap man." Mr.. Blaine ar
gued, and we were taught to regard
a coat as no good unless We paid
enough for it to make the wool cost
Il few cents more on the pound
wool cost anywhere else than in the
United States.
States Abandon Industry.
The tariff. which was intended to
stimulate the wool industry, killed it
in Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, for
the tariff that bolstered up wool, also
bolStered up the iron and steel indus
tries Of Ohio and Pennsylvania, and
! up the ~Monongahela Valley from
pittSburg big mills were built on the
river bottoms, and the farms were
cut up into town lots and cities grew
there. Foreigners came to work in
the mills, and to make a market for
country produce, with the result that
the little lamb went up to the butcher,
and the hill farms commenced to raise
Vegetables and stuff for people to eat,
~ New England had done. Western
Pennsylvania and Ohia have gradually
leased to be sheep range and have
come to be more and more vegetable
and fruit gardens, and the sheep
moved West, especially from Pennsyl-
vania.
They moved into the Rocky Noun
tain country and for a time a war
waged between the cattle men who
wanted the range for the big herds
Of cattle. and the sheepmen who
wanted their fiOckS to share the public
free grass. You can't feed our grass
to cattle and to sheep too, so be-
tween them, and with the encroach-
ment of the rancher who wanted to
raise food for the settlers in the mines
and in the towns, and along the devel-
oping railroads., the sheep and cattle
were both crowded as they crowded
each other.
The ranges of the West will net
stand too much grazing. and they
commenced to deteriorate. Cattle
grew scarcer. Sheep grew scarcer
Where some of the mountain states
graZed four or five million sheep {
few years ago they are getting dowr
t to four and three and two million
? and the number Of sheep grazed il
I the United States has been lesSenins
? year by year just as the Supply O.
: cattle on the range has been lessen
ing. In New England. in the middl,
$ states, in the Ohio River Valley tn,
sheep are still crowding off of tn
$ farms, and in the big West they ar,
e going the same way.
n Up in Minnesota, Wisconsin an
n | thar on,,nYr,, ord - tA1
in some of the other South sheep ar,
5 increasing. \ few years ago Pennsyl
vanla had twice as many sheep a
Virginia. Now Virginia has about a
many as Pennsylvania One state ha
y been going down. The other comm,
up. From 1900 to 1910 New Bingham
n lost half of her sheep. The middI
states did but little better. The shee
n are coming to the agricultural state
like Kentucky, Missouri, Iowa, an,
Minnesota.
A Chance in This State.
II North Carolina livestock men seer
To see a chance for the sheep on tn
vast acreage of land in this state no,
unused for any other purpose. Tn
le meat question is a pressing one a
n over the world now. This countr,
,e which once was a great export Of mea
mas on It's hands "A sufficient job in tr,
ie ing now to provide for it's own want
{. n tune has apparently arrived whe
n every community must hustle for il
self. The sheepmen see in the mur
lie ton trade a big chance for the futur
lie The business of raising sheep hs
IN moved West of Pennsylvania. OH
IN IS still a prominent sheep state. b,
SO ONO is a big meat consuming stat
Is North of Maryland and east of Oh
IN are barely two million sheep. Thel
are only half as many as twelve
lie ffteen years ago. Yet in that teri
10 tory are nearly thirty per cent of d
ne the people OF the United States.
LII With the supply of beef steadi
growing less in a market Steadyi
TO growing bigger mutton has a chan,
~ to go to market and demand any re;
Sonable price and be sure of a co,
ne Stantiy growing market for all vari
Ie. ~ of products. With the sheep bree
OF erS association classifying the ira,
n so that farmers can StandardiZe the
10 sheep products there is no state
or the Union that has a better chan
on for a permanent market than Nor
Carolina Without the association Il
In farmer would still be in poor sha
a to sell his lambs and wool. but wi
:" the cooperative work Of the aSSoci
80 N M nn ~