SECRETARY'S REPORT. 121 



speak further under the head of Winter Treatment,) do not all 

 go to grass, many being sold from milk and meal early, the 

 others go with the ewes to pasture, and are taken away in June 

 and July. There is a difference of opinion among the best 

 farmers, whether it is the most profitable course to have the 

 lambs dropped in February, to feed them wholly with meal and 

 hay, and sell them never having eaten grass ; or to have tliem 

 dropped later, and giving no meal, letting them to pasture with 

 the ewes, sell them later at a much lower rate. The first lambs 

 dro])ped and fed with meal sell from 84 to 86.50 each, and 

 are fit to go to market from the first to the middle of May. 

 Five dollars each is a ruling price for first-rate lambs for some 

 weeks, and then they decline, till finally the grass-fed lambs of 

 July fetch only 82 or 82.50. The cost of the meal to the lambs 

 being the only objection to the first course, the advantages 

 gained are several. In the first place the price obtained for the 

 early fed lambs, is considerably more than the extra keeping 

 added to the price of the late lambs. A dollar's worth of meal 

 is all the additional feed except the trifle of hay, which for a 

 twelve weeks' lamb would be very small. The manure from the 

 high fed lambs would be quite an item. Coming early, at a 

 season when farmers are not crowded with work, and that, 

 mostly about the house and barn, the ewes and lambs would be 

 more closely watched, and the proportion of loss much less ; 

 then the twin lambs, of which there should be two-thirds, and 

 their dams could be kept better and with more uniformity. And 

 finally, the money received for the lambs, comes just when the 

 farmer wants it, and when he has nothing else to convert into 

 money so easily and profitably. 



Before turning to pasture, the operation of " tagging," or 

 " clatting," so called in England, should be performed. Sheep, 

 on going out from dry to green feed are very apt to scour, and 

 the long locks of wool on their tails and beneath them, become 

 matted up and very filtliy, interfering with the health and com- 

 fort of the sheep. To prevent this, the straggling locks likely 

 to be fouled should be carefully clipped away. 



It is frequently the case, that on first turning out the flock, 

 some of the finest and healthiest lambs, full of health and play, 

 will be soon after found dead, without any apparent cause. 

 An intelligent farmer of Berkshire County, who had suffered 



