MODERN SHEEP : BREEDS AND MANAGEMENT. 243 



cat's work, for he will always eat the neck first before touching the 

 rest of the carcass. He is also very easy to trap with a steel trap 

 and is easily caught by means of dogs, as the dogs will trail and 

 tree him. Then he is easy to shoot. They are also easily poisoned 

 with rabbits. They do not roam around as much as the coyote, 

 but frequent one place till driven out or killed, while a coyote 

 may travel forty miles in a night. 



The small fox that inhabits this territory and other parts of 

 the west does not bother the flockmaster only when the lambs are, 

 small. He will then occasionally catch a young lamb, but as a 

 rule bothers but little. He is very easily trapped or poisoned and 

 will generally take any kind of bait; he is also easily caught with - 

 dogs. 



The bald eagle that makes its home in parts of the west is 

 often very troublesome to the sheepman when the sheep are young. 

 They are very hard to shoot, as they are a sly bird, but are easily 

 poisoned by baiting a rabbit or dead lamb with strychnine. They 

 always eat the liver the first thing. 



THIRD IN NUMBER OF SHEEP. 



New Mexico is at present the third state or territory in the 

 Union in number of sheep and value of wool. The dull times 

 from 1893 to 1897 seriously crippled the industry here, as every- 

 where else, but the good times since have more than recouped the 

 loss and at present (July, 1907) our sheep and wool industry is 

 in the very height of prosperity. The Colorado lamb feeders are 

 fast learning the value of the New Mexico lamb as a feeder and 

 every year the demand for our feeding lambs grows apace. 



When the Dingley Tariff law went into effect there was still 

 a large per cent of New Mexico sheep belonging to the class of 

 bare-bellies, previously described, and known as "Navajos," but 

 since that time there have been many car loads of fine bucks 

 brought into the territory from the ast and northwest and crossed 

 with the Navajo (pronounced Na-va-ho) ewes. 



MERINO BREEDS CROSS WELL. 



All the Merino breeds cross very well with the Navajo ewes, 

 about the third cross producing a very good sheep that will shear 

 about six pounds and a sheep that is ideal in our estimation as a 

 range sheep. These old Navajo sheep are rapidly disappearing 

 from the ranges that is, they are being improved by the use of 

 good rams but, owing to the slowness of the native Mexicans, 

 who own large numbers of sheep, to adopt any modern ideas, it 

 will be several years yet before they become very scarce on the 

 ranges. Some of the Mexicans claim that the improved breeds 



