THE BLACKFACED BREED OF SHEEP. 217 



for ewe stock ; another portion is more suitable for hoggs ; while 

 the more elevated and barren parts are only fit for the rearing of 

 wethers. One of the points of pastoral farming which has hitherto 

 been greatly overlooked, and which is now beginning to claim 

 the well-merited attention of farmers, is the drainage of hill 

 pastures. This is not only the means of removing many 

 dangerous streams, springs, and flat swampy bogs, which 

 usually intersects mountain pasture, but it improves the quality 

 of the grass, and prevents rot and other diseases which are 

 fostered by wet land. Fencing sheep pasture is a practice not 

 very extensively adopted, except on small farms where flocks 

 are confined, and require the constant attention of a shepherd. 

 Boundary fences are common in some parts of Britain, and 

 these prove advantageous. It would be of much service if the 

 practice of enclosing and dividing mountain farms was more 

 generally pursued. It would afford accommodation foy separat- 

 ing flocks as occasion required. On farms on which breeding is 

 regularly conducted, parks are specially valuable, though they 

 are not so common as they should be. Besides preventing 

 sheep from straying, they afford special facilities for keeping 

 tups and ewes separate, which becomes necessary at certain 

 seasons of the year, and also for the weaning of lambs. 



The southern districts of Scotland claim the honour of raisinci; 

 the best stock, and as being the districts in which the spirit of 

 improvement has been longest and most actively at work. In 

 the counties of Lanark, Ayr, Dumfries, Selkirk, and Mid-Lothian, 

 the greatest pains and attention have been bestowed on the 

 breeding process for a long period. The northern counties, 

 though at one time far behind in their production of stock, have 

 been pulling up within the past twenty or thirty years. 

 Farmers who had previously been groping in the dark, as to the 

 " secrets " of successful breeding, have recently been showing 

 inclinations to vindicate the honour of the Highland fleece. A 

 most active system of (Highland) sheep farming now exists 

 throughout the United Kingdom, and we have no doubt but, 

 " with a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull altogether," farmers 

 will yet acquire a much higher celebrity for their Highland 

 breed. The selection of tups, and the " weeding out" of inferior 

 females from the flocks, are now receiving a considerable 

 measure of that careful attention which these points so strongly 

 demand and so well deserve. 



'I'ups are generally put to the ewes from the 20th to the oOtli 

 of November, — according to the situation and character of the 

 farm, — but it is a widely recognised rule on mountain farms 

 that it is much better, both for the mother and the offsprinu:, to 

 have tlu' lambing a little too late rather than too earl v. In the 

 more northern and inland districts, flocks in the fall of tlie year 



