496 DAVIS COUNTY, IOWA. 



some cattle during the Summer. In fact, I think better profits 

 can be obtained from corn fed in Summer than in Winter. I 

 usually feed cattle one year younger, thereby getting greater 

 growth. Such cattle have sometimes attained a growth of six 

 hundred pounds each. They were Durham grades, two years 

 old. I commenced to feed in June, and sold at Christmas. 



HOGS. 



I have been breeding Poland China hogs for several years. 

 They are very good hogs ; perhaps not quite equal to the 

 Berkshire for very early fattening, but at sixteen or eighteen 

 months old they will make more pork. For small farmers, the 

 Berkshire proves the most profitable hog, more especially when 

 the feeder is situated so as to be able to sell his shoats when they 

 weigh one hundred pounds. They can be made to weigh that 

 amount with less grain than any breed with which I am 

 acquainted. 



SHEEP. 



I breed Cotswold sheep. They are better adapted to 

 mixed husbandry than the fine-wooled varieties, being very 

 much superior as a mutton sheep, and yielding larger quanti- 

 ties of wool, for which there has been a very fair demand of 

 late years. I was the first to introduce the Cotswold into this 

 country, by importing a carload from Canada about seven years 

 ago, since which time a marked improvement in the flocks of 

 the region has taken place. It is often remarked by sheep 

 buyers that the best grade of sheep found in any portion of 

 Iowa are to be found in this vicinity. My management of 

 sheep is very simple, and not expensive. My ewes never drop 

 their lambs until after the twentieth of April. The weather 

 is usually warm after that time, consequently I have little 

 trouble in looking after the lambs. The ewes are apt to lose 

 their lambs when dropped in Winter, or early Spring. There 

 is generally sufiBcient grass the last of April to give the ewes 

 plenty of milk, so my lambs grow from the start. I 

 wean them in August, so as to allow the ewes to get into good 

 flesh before Winter. My Winter management generally con- 



