

EAST OP THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 479 



Dr. Thomas P. Janes, in his Manual of Sheep Husbandry in Georgia, 

 cites this case: 



Mr. David Ayers, of Camilla, Mitchell County, in southwestern Georgia, where 

 snow never falls, and the ground seldom freezes, and where the original pine forest 

 is carpeted with the native grass, says his sheep, 3,500 in number, cost him annually 



14 cents per head, clip 3 pounds of unwashed wool, which sells at 30 cents per pound, 

 giving a clear profit of 90 per cent on the money and labor invested in sheep. Land 

 suited to sheep raising can be purchased in this section of the State for from $1.50 to 

 $10 per acre, according to location. Mr. Ayers does not feed his sheep at any time 

 during the year, neither had he introduced the improved breeds, using only what is 

 known as the native sheep. Of course, the cross of the Spanish Merino on this stock 

 would give better results in both quantity and quality of wool. These sheep receive 

 little care except to be gathered up once a year to be sheared and marked. Mr. Ayers 

 complains of the ravages of dogs on the sheep and of hogs and eagles on the lambs. 



The records of the United States Department of Agriculture furnish 

 an illustration from Pulaski County. A planter bought 800 head of 

 sheep in 1868, and furnished this statement : 



DR. 



Cost $750 



Cost of hand to care for them, $12, and $15 per month 180 



Cost of salting and incidental expenses 20 



CR. 



2,000 pounds of wool, at 30 cents per pound 600 



Increase, 225 lambs, at $1 per lamb 225 



15 acres of land, well manured, $10 per acre 150 



700 sheep on hand, at $1.50 per head 1, 050 



Total profit 1,075 



This, like that of Mr. Ayres, was the scrub stock of the piney-wood 

 counties of Georgia, the "piney- woods sheep," but it shows that in 

 Georgia, where pasturage costs nothing, sheep may be profitable even 

 for their wool alone. 



In a communication to Mr. John L. Hayes, under date of January 1, 

 1878, Mr. Bichard Peters, of Atlanta, said that nature had given 

 I Georgia three marked divisions, middle, lower, and upper Georgia, the 

 altitude rising with the latitude. Each of these sections has its own 

 especial advantages for wool-growing, and it can be profitably pursued 

 in either section. The lower part of the State, across which there is a 

 belt of country of an extent northward from the coast and the Florida 

 line from 100 to 150 miles, is the land of the long-leaf pine and the wire 

 grass, and the home of the piney- woods sheep. Flocks of these native 

 sheep, as high as 3,500 in number, are found here and there scattered over 

 the surface, receiving but little care or attention except at the annual 

 gathering for shearing and marking. Very little can be said for the 

 quantity or quality of wool raised here, and Mr. Peters did not sub- 



