26 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



as I go over the old routes again I can see but meager results 

 for my eiforts, except in this, — that quite often some one 

 comes to me at the close of a meeting and says, in effect, '' I 

 began the raising of rape after you urged it at such a time, 

 and have kept it up ever since, and it has done for me all 

 that you claimed for it ; " and, while I will not say to you 

 that it is best for you to go into sheep, I will say most em- 

 phatically that if you raise sheep you must raise rape or its 

 equivalent. You may use thousand-headed kale or curly 

 Scotch kale, but you must raise something to finish your 

 lambs with, to take the place of gTain. Rape should be good 

 up to the market time for Christmas. It matters not if 

 there is a foot of snow, the lambs will get every particle of 

 it ; and experiment has sho\\m that no feed, however rich, 

 no feeder, however expert, can make a lamb grow equal to 

 rape, with the animals running on the ground where there 

 is some little roughage, like frost-bitten second crop of grass, 

 or access to corn stalks, oat straw or anything of that sort. 

 Lambs so fed will gain more per day and will stand a long 

 shipment before killing better than grain-fed lambs. You 

 will readily see the great saving in cost at the present prices 

 of grain, also a saving in health and loss from heavy feeding. 

 But let us retui'n to our example, who had turned his entire 

 lamb flock upon rape. He let them run until time for the 

 Christmas market, when he notified the local drover to come 

 and see his lambs. The drover told him to go over the fl<ick 

 and sort out the culls, and the next morning he would come 

 and buy those that were fit to go. The next morning he 

 drove the lambs to the barn, and this was the first time that 

 they had ever been confined under a roof. The buyer came 

 and supposed that the lambs had been sorted^ as there were 

 no culls, and bought the whole lot at 6i/o cents per pound, to 

 be weighed at the cattle yard the next Monday, I/2 a cent 

 above the highest quotation in Watertown ; and when the 

 lambs were weighed they made 98l/> pounds each. His 

 ewes sheared 7 pounds to the fleece, and he received 26 cents 

 per pound, — his ewes had earned for him $8.22 each. His 

 flock had earned for him $730.80. His brood mare had 

 raised a foal, there had been a little income from the two 



