454 MISCELLANEOUS SUBJECTS 



known to give specially good results cost from five to 

 ten times as much. The rich milk of the ewes relieved 

 of the duty of rearing their lambs is made, during a period 

 of four months or more, into butter and cheese. Broad- 

 tails are known to be much better milkers than fat-rumps. 



Many farmers in the Crimea and North Caucasus have 

 introduced Karakul rams, and in 1909 the Roumanian 

 Government bought a number to encourage the farmers 

 to begin the breeding of lamb-fur, but unfortunately 

 most of the animals were Arabi-Afghans, and only those 

 that had little or no fine wool on them gave the desired 

 results. The Karakul-Duzbai ram alone produces a 

 useful cross; that by the Karakul ewe and a ram of 

 another breed is inferior. 



Dr. Young throws valuable light on the position of 

 the trade in the distribution of rams and of their prices 

 and quality, in a report on the sale of ninety Karakul rams 

 among other Asiatic sheep, which took place at Moscow 

 in October, 1912. Many were sold at 80 to 300 and 600 

 roubles each, although the best tight-curl producers were 

 few. In the great majority of cases there was evidence 

 of a strain of the white fine-woolled Afghan, a type of 

 wool that seriously injures the formation and the tight- 

 ness of the curl as well as its lustre, which implies an 

 open-curled lamb skin at the unsatisfactory price of 

 12s. 6d. to :6s. 6d., in place of 2 for good skins. The 

 impurity of blood was indicated by the soft wool on the 

 head, neck, abdomen and body, and even on the lower 

 extremities of the limbs, which in the true fur-producing 

 sheep are always covered with very lustrous, jet-black, 

 stiff hair, similar to the hair of the face and ears. There 

 were only about ten of the best fur-producing sheep in 

 the consignment. Dr. Young bought two Karakul- 

 Duzbais at a high price, as well as a four-horned Kara- 

 chaev buck and one monster Kalmic or fawn fat-rump, 

 the nearest representatives of the original wild Oms 

 steatopyga (if such ever existed). 



A broad-tail Voloshskaya hybrid, which strongly 

 resemb'es the Lincoln ewe, was rejected (though said to 

 be almost as heavy as a llama) because experts like 

 Sinitzen stated it would not breed true to type a dictum 

 now questioned by Young and eminent Russian breeders. 



