THE FARMERS' CABINET, 



AND 



AMERICAN HERD-BOOK, 



DEVOTED TO 



AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, AND RURAL AND DOMESTIC AFFAIRS. 



' The Producuons of the Earth will always lie in proportion to the culture bestowed upon it." 



Vol. V No. 10. 



5th mo. (May,) 1.5th, 1841. 



[Whole No. 76. 



KI3IBER & SHARPLESS, 



PROPRIETORS AND PUBLISHERS, 



No. 50 North Fourth Street, 



PHILADELPHIA. 

 Price one dollar per year.— For conditions see last page. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet, 

 Rot in Sheep. 



Mr. Editor, — The attention of agricultu- 

 rists having been drawn, by many well-writ- 

 ten articles in the Cabinet, to the considera- 

 tion of sheep-husbandry on a larger scale 

 than has hitherto been practised — by which it 

 appears that the taste for mutton has riseii 

 in the market — I am induced to address a few 

 lines in the way of urging upon those who 

 contemplate raising and feeding sheep-stock 

 as a system, to be quite prepared, before they 

 commence operations. And to this end their 

 fences should be particularly attended to, and 

 crops prepared for winter food, with a good 

 enclosure and a suitable shed to serve as a 

 place of shelter and perfect security during 

 the feeding at that season of the year. All 

 these things premised, however, I do not 

 know of a more convenient or profitable stock 

 than a flock of well-bred sheep, suffiaiently 

 numerous to call for and remunerate the ser- 

 vices of an individual well acquainted with 

 the habits of those animals, and competent 

 to take the charge of them at all times and 

 under all circumstances — a real, thorough- 

 bred shepherd. Few persons are aware of 

 the great difference which exists between 

 a good breed of sheep and a bad one ; " a sheep 

 is a sheep," to be sure, but, as has been said 

 of the different breeds of cattle for the dairy, 

 there is more than 100 per cent, difference 

 between a good animal and a bad one, the 

 one giving a profit, the other a loss. Now com- 

 pare the difference in value between many 

 of those long-backed, herring-bellied crea- 

 tures which are so often brought to the cities 

 for slaughter, and for which SJil 50 is a high 

 price, with those lately fed by Major Raybold, 

 of Delaware, a part of one of which was ex- 

 hibited at a late meeting of the Philadelphia 

 Agricultural Society, measuring 4| inches 

 clear fat at the end of the ribs — a wether, 

 only two years old, one of a lot of thorough- 

 bred Leicester or Bakewells, which had been 



Cab.— Vol. V.— No. 10. 



drawn from the flock for feeding, some of 

 which weighed more than 40 pounds per 

 quarter, and brought !$30 a head from the 

 i butcher! Can there well be a greater differ- 

 ence in 7i«a7i?jfy an<i quality? And at this 

 present time lamb is selling in the Philadel- 

 phia market at .*$1 50 per quarter, where it 

 might tpve been a month ago. Now, here 

 are five^oUars for the lamb and the ewe to 

 fatten dijring the summer, her fleece paying 

 for her Ijeep — need there be a more profita- 

 ble cropJconsidering, too, that it prepares it- 

 self forpiarket without ploughing, sowing, 

 reaping,J3r mowing] and leaving behind it 

 a far moje profitable return in manure than 

 its wholj cost of keep in the ordinary way. 



Therdis one consideration, however, which 

 demandgthe most careful and visjilant atten- 

 tion ; in ^11 probability much of the land that 

 might b^ devoted to sheep-husbandry may be 

 unsoundjfrom its want of drainage and pro- 

 per cultption, and thus become the means 

 of rottiiF the whole flock in a very short 

 space of]time, even, as has often been declared, 

 in a fe\V hours' feeding upon it: this must be 

 particulrly guarded against, and the flock 

 must baprevented from stepping a hoof upon 

 a soil 4spBCted of unsoundness, which soil, 

 although it might be fed with impunity by 

 horses |r cattle, would be destructive to the 

 flock, these situations are easily and quickly 

 discovaed by the rank and washy species of 

 grass ad plants which infest them, and are 

 easily cired by draining and moderate liming. 

 Salt ah, is a most effectual preservation 

 againslthis cruel disorder; but this should 

 be alwiys kept before the flock in troughs 

 protecid from the weather by a slight roof; 

 dry foa always accompanying it while the 

 flock ijfeeding on suspected ground. 



Mau theories have been entertained re- 

 spectiij the cause of this destructive mala- 

 dy — tli Rot in Sheep — some persons sup- 

 posing;hat the eg-gs of the flukes, which are 



al way 

 and gi 

 ease. 



found in great abundance in the livers 

 1-bladder of sheep dying in this dis- 

 ve been taken into the stomach with 



the giss upon which the sheep have been 

 feedin — while others consider that these ani- 

 malcue are only the effect of disease, engen- 

 dered y the putrid contents of the stomach, 

 occasiied by the cold and watery and acid 

 propel y of the food taken by the sheep while 



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