568 SHEEP INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES 



A comparison of the weight of fleeces from 1840 to 1890 shows a 

 marvelous increase. As the figures for 1840 are not deemed reliable 

 we will exclude them from the comparison we are about to make and 

 deal only with the figures as given from 1850 to 1890. From 1850 to 

 1860 the average weight of fleece increased 16 per cent; from 1860 to 

 1870 the increase was 40 per cent ; from 1870 to 1880 it was 23 per 

 cent, and from 1880 to 1890 about 8 per cent. From 1850 to 1890, a 

 period of forty years, the increase was 114 per cent. To put it in 

 another way, 100 sheep would shear as many pounds of wool in 1890 as 

 108 in 1880; as many as 134 in 1870; as many as 185 in 1860, and as 

 many as 210 in 1850. It would require 100 sheep in 1850 to shear 258 

 pounds of wool; in 1860 it would require 86 sheep; in 1870 it would 

 require but 62 sheep, in 1880 but 50, and in 1890 only 46. In 1890 the 

 number of sheep exceeded those of 1850 but 660, yet the yield of wool 

 was more than double. Again a hundred-acre farm that would raise 

 100 sheep in 1850, producing 258 pounds of wool, would raise the same 

 number in 1890 producing 553 pounds; or to put it in another light, if 

 it required 100 acres to raise 258 pounds of wool in 1850 it would require 

 but 46 acres to raise the same amount of wool in 1890. Still another 

 element comes into the calculation. Sheep are great fertilizers to the 

 soil, and land on which they have grazed for many years has its pro- 

 ducing qualities increased all the way from 10 to 50 per cent. Allow- 

 ing it to be the former figure and including this increased fertility in 

 our calculation we arrive at the conclusion that about 40 acres in 1890 

 produced as much wool as 100 acres in 1850. 



The value of sheep as help to wheat : growing has not been as highly 

 appreciated in Ohio as in some other sections, yet its value has been 

 acknowledged. It is reported of Erie County that in 1887 its sheep 

 industry had greatly declined, whereas in former years the flockmas- 

 ters were numbered by hundreds. Many sold out entire flocks, and a 

 further reduction would have followed were it not for the fact that the 

 wheat-growers who cleared their fields found the flocks a good adjunct, 

 the one helping the other. What is true of Erie County is true in other 

 counties of the State, and wheat and wool-growing go hand in hand. 

 An instance is on record where a wheat-grower allowed his flock to 

 graze upon part of a field of winter wheat which had been so badly 

 frozen in the spring that it was thought to be ruined, and who was much 

 surprised to find upon harvesting and thrashing his crop that the por- 

 tion cropped close to the ground by the sheep yielded at the rate of 

 several bushels per acre more than that portion upon which the sheep 

 had not been permitted to run. Since then he has practiced pasturing 

 his wheat fields until past the middle of April of each year, and has 

 succeeded in raising on an average from 25 to 30 bushels per acre. 



