352 MORBID APPETITE IN SHEEP. 



about the Murrumbidgee, would, nevertheless, 

 send his rams and wethers on the luxuriant pas- 

 turage, as the best place to fatten them ; in- 

 deed, all concurred that rams, wethers, and 

 even the ewes, if not breeding, thrive and fatten 

 upon that pasturage land about the Murrum- 

 bidgee country, which proves so destructive to 

 breeding-ewes and their lambs. 



Mr. Manton had sheep on the limestone 

 ranges, near the banks of the Murrumbidgee 

 river ; they became impoverished, and acquired 

 the morbid appetite for devouring the young 

 lambs ; but when he removed them to a granite 

 soil, in the vicinity of Yas Plains, they speedily 

 recovered their former good condition, and the 

 morbid appetite left them, more probably from 

 there being no " water holes" containing saline 

 earth about the place, than from the change of 

 strata ; however, they never returned to the un- 

 natural practices, as was so frequent on the 

 sheep-runs at the former place. 



At Jugiong, Mr. O'Brien suffered in the loss 

 of lambs from the same cause ; but by occa- 

 sionally changing the pasturage, it was checked 

 in some degree ; and although lambs were 

 sometimes lost, yet the destruction was much 

 lessened. 



Even when the lambs are not devoured or de- 



