DORSET HORNED SHEEP. 403 



there can be no better authority, as, in addition to the monster 

 auction for ewes, before referred to, he holds an annual auction 

 for Dorset horn rams at his Dorchester repository in the month 

 of May. In a communication rendered expressly for this article 

 as late as December, 1886, he says : " Owing to the enterprise of 

 many eminent breeders, Dorset sheep have entirely supplanted 

 the Downs during the past few years, especially in the locality of 

 Dorchester and on those chalk land farms having good water- 

 meadows and pastures. This is no doubt greatly due to the 

 circumstances that they possess good quality, fatten readily, and 

 incur but little risk in lambing, while the lambs come to early 

 maturity for market." As to their more recent improvement, 

 Mr. Ensor writes : *' Owing to the larger areas of turnips grown 

 and the use of corn and cake in their feeding, together with the 

 very careful selection they have undergone by eminent breeders, 

 they have during the last few years been doubled in size, their 

 fleeces are twice as heavy as before, while fattening propensity 

 has been increased to the extent that the best Dorset lambs now 

 arrive at maturity quite as early as the Downs: Although they 

 have been so much iinproved, they retain their hardihood and 

 fecundity as much as ever. Prizes are now offered by the 

 Dorchester Agricultural Society to the shepherds who rear the 

 largest number of lambs with the least loss of ewes compared 

 to the number placed with the rams. In 1884 the two flocks 

 in which the shepherds won the chief prizes were those of 

 Mr. W. Hull, Durce, Dorchester, and Mr. Gale, Broadway, 

 Weymouth. The number of ewes of the former gentleman was 

 700, from which 867 lambs were reared with the loss of tWelve 

 ewes. Mr. Gale's ewes consisted of 360, from which 466 lambs 

 were reared with the loss of only three ewes. In 1885 these 

 flocks gave very similar returns. Mr. Hull's ewes, 716 in 

 number, sustained thirteen losses, and reared 879 lambs, and Mr. 

 Gale's 360 ewes only lost five, while the rearage of lambs was 

 473. Three other flocks also stood high in the competition of 

 that year, which were Mr. W. Mayo's, of Friar, Waddon, con- 

 sisting of 607 ewes, of which 19 suffered mortality, the rearage 

 of lambs being 762 ; Mr. E. Smith's of 450, the number lost 

 being seven, and the lambs reared 574, and 360 belonging to 

 Mr. Flower, of Stafford, Dorchester, of which only a single one 



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