754 SHEEP INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES 



Until very recently all that vast country in South Dakota lying west 

 of the Missouri, comprising something over one-half of the entire area 

 of the State, was set aside by the Government as the Sioux Indian 

 Reservation. But in 1889 the reservation was diminished, about one- 

 third of the lands being ceded to the Government. This opened up a 

 magnificent and well- watered grazing land, which is destined to be- 

 come a wealthy live-stock region, it contains the bulk of the rough 

 and broken country and the only mountainous section of the State, the 

 Black Hills. Western South Dakota, according to the State auditor's 

 report for 1891, contained 14 per cent of the horses, mules, and asses; 

 15 per cent of the cattle, about 9 per cent of the sheep, and a trifle over 

 1 per cent of the swine. This is a significant showing, in view of the 

 short time since it has been open to stockmen, and indicates something 

 of the possibilities in the future of the animal industry of this region. 



The transmissouri portion of South Dakota in all probability will be 

 the only place where live stock will be held in large flocks, or where 

 stock-raising will be made an exclusive business to any great extent, 

 the stock business in the eastern part of the State being naturally a 

 part of mixed farming. 



The sheep industry of South Dakota is of vast consequence to the 

 future welfare of the State, because it is the most pronounced departure 

 from exclusive wheat-raising yet attempted. It is also an advanced 

 step in the direction of diversified agriculture, which is so necessary to 

 insure permanent prosperity to those dependent on farming. 



The sheep industry has afforded the farmers of the State much 

 needed relief and given them renewed hope, as is shown by the follow- 

 ing extract from an article in the Dakota Farmer by C. A. Fowler, of 

 Beadle County, who says : 



The slieep industry is of vital importance to the people of Dakota. It gives them 

 better returns for their labor than any other part of farming. The drought and 

 winds will come, as they have done from the dim ages of the past, or this country 

 would not have been a prairie of such vast extent. Where the rainfall has been 

 sufficient there are heavy growths of timber, as the coast mountains, the Sierra Ne- 

 vada, the Rocky Mountains, and the country east of the Mississippi River, where 

 the rainfall is 40 inches or more annually, abundantly prove. With a flock of sheep 

 we will be better contented, and not feel so worried about blighted crops, as we 

 will have something left to keep the u wolf from the door." The sheep industry 

 must be our main one for some time to come. Irrigation we will have, and it will 

 do for Dakota what it does for other irrigated regions, but we will be older than we 

 are now before the farmers are generally supplied with water. But if Dakota is 

 covered over with sheep we can stay here, confidently believing that with this in- 

 dustry and irrigation we will have the grandest farming region in America. When 

 thousands of springs are flowing from their inexhaustible subterranean river we 

 will forget the tribulations through which we have passed; forget our ruined fields 

 and blighted hopes in beholding the great fields of golden grain, the millions of 

 sheep upon the hills, and the millions of happy and prosperous people who will 

 dwell in Dakota ; and we will forget the past, for the "wilderness and solitary places 

 shall be made glad, and the desert will blossom as the rose." 



The writer of this report desires to acknowledge the valuable assist- 



