178 BRITISH SHEEP AND SHEPHERDING. 



unless all features of the changes are well considered previously, 

 and are proved, at any rate on a small scale, to be more advan- 

 tageous than those practices they are to usurp. 



Knowledge of Markets. Without change, however, improve- 

 ments cannot be made, but alterations are not likely to prove 

 valuable unless they are made by those who possess exceptional 

 skill and experience. Those with great knowledge of the markets, 

 and who are able to judge from the amount of food there is likely 

 to be throughout the country at a given time, are able to foretell 

 whether prices are likely to be high or low at a particular date 

 in the future. These are justified in consuming their fodder 

 at the customary period, or may reserve it so as to have it available 

 at a time when sheep keep is likely to be scarce. For instance, 

 in dry summers it is often difficult to get a good plant of turnips ; 

 and even transplanted crops, such as kale and cabbages, which, 

 as a rule, may be successfully planted at a much later date than is 

 possible for swedes and mangolds to be sown to produce a remuner- 

 ative crop, do not thrive. When this happens, the spring sheep 

 feed throughout the country is necessarily small in quantity. 

 Yet the same number of sheep have to be supported as in a more 

 plentiful year. To keep the sheep healthy and thriving, the supply 

 of spring food has to be drawn on, leaving little for that period 

 known as " between roots and grass," which is usually from March 

 to May, and depends very much in duration on the earliness of 

 spring growth. 



In seasons of great shortness it is often particularly remunerative 

 to save the food until spring, and then to buy in sheep, which, 

 as others cannot afford to keep them, are necessarily sold at 

 reduced prices ; but when the fresh supply of summer keep becomes 

 available they rise in value again, thus giving to persons in a 

 position to purchase them in times of scarcity of food the 

 advantage of the rise in price, in addition to the increased value 

 due to their greater size and improved condition. When food 

 is thus saved until spring, a much larger number of sheep can 

 obviously be kept during the short period mentioned than if they 

 had been kept throughout the winter, yet each individual sheep will 

 probably pay more for the short time than those which were 

 bought in the autumn. It is to an extent a speculation : so, 

 however, is the purchasing of sheep in the autumn, when the 

 risk of loss of life and disease has to be run for a long period. 

 Many thousands of sheep are bought in in the autumn in such 

 years, and the buyers know there is practically no chance of 

 profit ; yet, because it is the custom of the district to buy at 

 that season, they do it year after year. In no other business 

 would such a course be followed. 



Time to Buy. The time to buy is when there is a fair chance of 



