Norwich bulletin., 1918-03-08
ADVICE THAT MAKES THE FARMERS SMILE

AtAh IfaSSisALtAu ANlllE isn't any economical or easy otEnt in itself. He stocked it with several thousand acclimated sheep put :heTn in charge of an experienced shepherd, provided shelters for tne.a from storms, etc.:. in short Gid everything man can do to start his i2augSry of right and keep 1t going right. t
 Later. he sold what were left for anything he could get, paid of as many of his bills as tie money would cover, and began hunting for Q job from some other farmer
 -'--
 He hadn't ree!<oned accurately encush on just two things; to wit, namely, that is. to say, the mondness Of dogs for mutton and the capacity of the wool and meat trusts to seques- trate all his possible profits to the.r own treaSuries> --, -
 Half wild mongrel dogs worried and harried his sheep till they were scat tered over seven townships; foxes caught and devoured his young lambs; the meat trust tearfully, eonfided to him that it couldn't. possibly pay him for his mutton and lamb but about one sixth of the price itself sold that mutton and lamb for and the wool trust, without any pretense at tears, offered him just enough for his wool to pay the cost of shearing. tieing and transportation and bade him take | it or leave it as he pleased: the trust didn't care.
 That, mind you, was in the times when good ewes sold freely in fiocks for s or less per head; when wire fencing cost half what it does now, and when wages were less than half what they are now.
 I can easily remember the time when three farmers out of four in this yicin- ity had flocks of from twenty to five l hundred sheep, as a matter of course. But, as costs went up and returns dwindled, the f1ocks one by one dis appeared till today know of not over six farmers in the whole township who have so much as a single one. myself used to keep few sheep. At first they somewhat more than paid their way. Then it began to be doubt full if they did even that. I stuck to 1 them, however, till I had kept them two, full years at a loss. When my accounts showed me that one year they cost me 90 cents each more than they 1 brought in, while the next year I paid a little over a dollar and a half apiece 1 for the privilege of feeding them and 1 tending to them, then, I also. quit. Now comes along an editor of ar l implement Journal, and tells Us farm CTS that sheep can be produced profit ably on almost any farm. If he hac eraS hat that they could be produced, under 1 Present exceptional conditions, or
 rather more farms than now hay, them he might have stayed within gunshot of the facts. But his as | serticnd as he makes it, is simpl! lpiffie and bosh. If he had l1nowI | anything whatever about the prac tical side of sheep raising he woult never have made it.
 There you have the thing that make, us farmers irritable and that dis courages us: the jumping on us Q. ten thousand well meaning but pit. iably farm ignorant outsiders to tel i Us what we can do ard how we car knew a little somethingi
 It may be you can raise sheeI l profitahly,-you specially and indi vidually. It may be you can pa,
 double or tripse price for fencing and double price for labor, and tripl, or Quadruple price for winter fodder and s15 to s20 apiece for breeding ewes, and still get a profit off thei wool and lamb and mutton output If you can it is your privilege to d, so. Not only your privilege, but you patriotic duty. For there's no doub that wool is going to be dangerousl,
 scarce in the immediate future. you can see your way merely to breal even with them,-to get your none. back, without any pay for your owl labor and risk. you'll be serving you
 country be trying them again. l you've got the spare capital availabl
 and can afford to blow in'' part o it, I'm not sure but you'd be doinl quite as periodically to spend it ol wool production as to buy LFbert.
 bonds with it. Tha service to th
 country might be even greater iii tn donation of. wool than in the invest ment of money.
 1 But in any case, it's up to you t
 decide, on your own knowledge c
 your own conditions. 4
 It is NOT for philanthropic Ney
 York heiresses, nor for editors of me
 chanical journals, nor for city bre
 non farmers of any class or any off
 cial position to dictate to you hoy you shall farm it,-unless they wi
 furnish the capital pay the expenses
 and take all risk of the losses.
 We farmers are being told 'stee
 times day that upon us and our ca
 pacity for production depends tn I t1xYs-. fV1> r< fi-
 morning papers; We get it in tn ,, weekly papers; we get it in tn monthly magazines; we get it i :, special publications and in irregula , bulletins from this, that and the othe bureau CT department
 And nine hundred, and ninety min sl.oJ.5aoaIas of it comes from men wh don't know any more about the prac ticai side of farming than we ol
 codgers behind the blows know abol the technique Of trench fighting i
 F7anderr.
 What government would intr11st th
 leadership of it's army to a civilia
 who doesn't know the difference be
 tween chevron and a barrage?
 Yet the agriculture army of tt
 United States is expected to C wonders under the alleged leadershj
 of lot of volunteer or official es
 horters and captains whose know
 edge of farm conditions is too ofte illustrated by that dear woman amazement at finding that cows
 France, were millSed twice a dayi
 Since we are going to need an in
 nsense amount of wool and are Il,
 at present in the way to supply