206 Progress of Agricultural Knoxdedge 



repeatedly told by farmers that where two flocks have been kept 

 in one field — one fed with corn, the other not — the difference may 

 be distinctly seen along the line where the hurdles had stood in 

 the following crop of barley, marking the efficacy of high feed- 

 ing.* Still, good as the system is, it has this disadvantage in 

 comparison with the feeding of beasts, that the straw grown on 

 the farm is not made into strong dung, but is merely trampled 

 in large yards, from which it comes out very little changed even 

 in its appearance. 



But Mr. Childers has brought forward interesting experiments, 

 which show that sheep, as well as oxen, thrive much better for warmth 

 and shelter. He states that '' eighty Leicester sheep, on the bare 

 field, consumed about 50 basketfuls of cut turnips per day, besides 

 oil-cake." '^ On being brought into the shed," he proceeds, " to my 

 surprise, they were immediately only able to consume 30 baskets, 

 and before a month had elapsed the quantity had decreased to 25 

 baskets ; thus economising one-half the turnips : they also ate less 

 oil-cake. I found, nevertheless, that their increase was as rapid 

 this year as it was the year before. "f In the year before, the 

 sheep in the shed had gained one-third more than those in the 

 field : so that here was a saving of one-half of the turnips, with 

 a gain of one-third of meat. Now this result agrees precisely 

 with the most recent discoveries of Dr. Liebig, who has shown 

 that the natural heat of the body is kept up by the use of food, 

 and that the greater the cold the larger must be the consumption 

 of food ; and he instances the Samoyedes, who eat ten pounds of 

 meat daily. '' Warm clothing," he adds, ''is a substitute for ex- 

 cess of food." Now I do not say that we are at once to house all 

 our sheep : because, apart from the labour of carting home the 

 turnips and carrying out the dung, the treading of the sheep is 

 almost indispensable on light soils for rendering them firm. But 

 I do think Mr. Childers's discovery most important, and well 

 worth the serious consideration of sheep-farmers ; and that, in 

 time, it may become the foundation of a change of practice — that 

 the fatting sheep, for instance, may be housed, and the breeding 

 ewes be left on the land, or the fatting sheep be housed by night 

 in winter, or, as Mr. Childers suggests, during the heat of the 

 sun in September. It may be said, indeed, why house sheep in 

 heat, if cold is to be guarded against ? Partly because heat dis- 

 agrees with them, as is shown by their panting beneath the sun and 

 seeking the shade, and partly because one advantage of housing 

 them is the saving of dung : for many farmers suspect that there 



* In one instance, where a vei-y dry summer followed, the advantage was 

 in favour of the less highly dressed land; a strong instance of the power of 

 dung to injure barley in a dry summer upon burning land. 



t On Shed- feeding, by Mr. Childers— Journal, i., pp. 169 and 407. 



