1052 Rural School Leaflet. 



they have free range, less than one hundred tons being sufficient for 

 twenty-five hundred sheep. 



The wethers are handled in bands of two or three thousand, while 

 the ewes are handled in bands of about half this size, since the care of 

 lambing ewes in the spring is a big item. The increase of the flock per 

 year is reckoned at about 75% to 80%. The weather during the lambing 

 season is often wet and rainy and the young lambs must be kept in 

 shelter if it is not bright and warm. Hence, careful watch of the flock 

 must be kept by the herder, and all the new lambs and their mothers 

 must be picked up and brought to the main corral for shelter. This 

 work is done by a man and a team working under direction of the chief 

 herder. After the young lambs are strong enough to leave the corral, 

 the "lamb" band is made up. This is added to from day to day as 

 the new lambs come until it becomes the main band. 



Then comes the shearing of the flock before it is turned to pasture. 

 The wool crop is very important to the big sheep farmer. He expects 

 enough from the wool to pay the cost of maintaining his flock, and the 

 profit comes from the number of sheep which can be sent to market 

 each fall. Shearing is done in modern times on the large ranches entirely 

 by power, such machines as the one pictured in the February Leaflet 

 (Fig. 72) being used, but being driven by power instead of by hand. 



As hot dry weather approaches and the plains and lower valleys dry 

 up, the entire flock is trailed or moved by train to the upper or summer 

 ranges higher in the mountains. On the summer range the flock is in 

 charge of herders whose business it is to move it from place to place to 

 obtain fresh pasturage, to avoid poisonous weeds and wolves, and to 

 care for the sheep in general. The herder stays with the band the entire 

 season, living in a sheep- wagon, and being provided with supplies once 

 or twice a week from headquarters. When the flock is large the herders 

 often work in pairs — one working with the sheep, while the other does 

 the cooking and the work about the wagon Near the wagon is usually 

 a temporary corral which is moved from place to place with the remainder 

 of the camp as the demands of the flock for fresh pasturage require. 

 With large flocks the herding is usually done on horseback, while in the 

 case of flocks of twenty or twenty-five hundred sheep the herder and his 

 dogs may be alone and work on foot, being visited and furnished with 

 supplies at intervals of two or three days by the camp tender who helps 

 the herder move camp when necessary. 



Probably nowhere in the world is the use of dogs of so much advantage 

 to the shepherds as on these big ranches. The Scotch Collie is pre- 

 ferred in all cases. He is very intelligent and hardy and the shepherds 



