DECLINE OF SHEEP-BREEDING 185 



(Alsina, Puan, Bahia Blanca, Villarino) continued to 

 grow, and increased by a third. Those on the lands 

 of the central Pampa increased threefold. On the 

 other hand, in the departments north and south of the 

 Sierra de Tandil, where colonization is older, sheep- 

 breeding is stationary. The north-east and south-east 

 areas, between the Parana and the Salado, have dimin- 

 ished : one losing a fifth, and the other a half, of its 

 flocks. 



From 1895 onward the number of flocks of sheep 

 on the Pampean plain decreased rapidly. The number 

 of sheep had sunk from 34,000,000 in 1908 to 18,000,000 

 in 1915 for the Buenos Aires province ; from 2,800,000 

 in 1908 to 2,300,000 in 1914 for the central Pampa. 

 The reduction was general, and found in every district ; 

 but it was not equally great everywhere, and did not 

 begin at the same date in every district. Sheep-breeding 

 has almost entirely disappeared from the eastern 

 belt, east of the Salado, which was its cradle. South 

 of Buenos Aires the sheep are giving place to horned 

 cattle, and they had almost disappeared by 1908. 

 North of Buenos Aires they survived long, but the 

 reduction of the flocks has only been the more rapid 

 since 1908. This corresponds with the advance of 

 maize-growing. In six years the Bartolome Mitre and 

 Pergamino departments have lost, respectively, four- 

 fifths and five-sixths of their sheep. In the north-west 

 of the Buenos Aires province the sheep began to be 

 reduced at the time when the lucerne farms were 

 founded, about 1900. The decrease has since gone on 

 uninterruptedly. The actual flocks represent one- 

 fourth of the flocks of 1895. In the south-west (wheat 

 belt) there was a rapid shrinkage before 1908, but it 

 seems to have almost been arrested since then, thanks 

 to the combining of sheep-reaiing with wheat and 

 oats. The actual flocks are about one-half the flocks 

 of 1895, Finally, in the area north of the Sierra de 

 Tandil the sheep retreat before the cattle, as they do 



