1004 



PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part III. 



own ; and accordingly from this work, and an excellent account published in the 

 Supplement to the Encyclopeedia Britannica, we have extracted what follows. 



6451. A generalidea of the extent and nature of a store farm maybe obtained by 

 referring to that of Thirlstane in Ettrick forest, a plan of which {fg. 678.) is given bv 



678 



Captain Napier. It contains one thousand six hundred and fifty-one acres ; of which 

 one thousand four hundred and sixty-four acres are in open hill pasture, seventy in 

 plantation, forty in arable and meadow, about sixty in six enclosures, and the rest in shep- 

 herd's and other cottager's houses, vv^ith their allowance of ground for a garden and cow. 

 What distinguishes this farm from most others is the number of stells or small circular 

 enclosures (o) for sheltering and feeding cattle during storms of snow, which are distri- 

 buted over it; being no fewer than thirty-seven. The advantages of these stells in dis- 

 tricts where sheep are liable to be buried by snow, Captain Napier considers very great, 

 and to promote their more general introduction seems to have been one principal induce- 

 ment for publishing his book. We shall recur to the subject in the following section, 

 when treating of cotting, folding, housing, &c. 



6452. In the practice of store farming the rams are put to the ewes for the purpose of 

 copulation in November, a little earlier or later, according to the prospect of spring food, 

 but seldom before the eighth or tenth of that month. The number of rams required is 

 more or less, according to the extent of the pasture, and their own age and condition. 

 If the ewes are not spread over an extensive tract, one ram to sixty ewes is generally 

 sufficient. It is usually thought advisable to separate the gimmers (sheep once shorn) 

 from the older ewes, and to send the rams to the latter eight or ten days before they are 

 admitted to the former. Notwithstanding this precaution, which retards their lambing 

 season till the spring is farther advanced, ewes which bring their first lamb when two 

 years old, the common period on the best hill farms, are often very bad nurses, and in a 

 late spring lose a great many of their lambs, unless they are put into good condition with 

 turnip before lambing, and get early grass afterwards. This separation, and difference 

 in the time of admitting the rams to the ewes and gimmers, should therefore be always 

 attended to. When a farm under this description of stock has the convenience of ^few 

 good inclosures (as in Thirlstane farm for example), still more minute attention is paid 

 by skilful managers. It is not sufficient that the rams are carefully selected from perhaps 



