Types and Market Classes of Live Stock 



257 



ing more flesh. A very popular weight for the bulk of feeder lambs 

 is around 55 pounds, though choice feeder lambs, which carry some- 

 what more flesh than the average, weigh from 55 to 65 pounds. As a 

 rule, the 55-pound lamb can be finished in the usual 90 to 120-day 

 feeding period at a weight of around 80 pounds. Western lambs 

 usually make average monthly gains on feed of from 7 to 10 pounds 

 per month, including considerable time required to get them safely on 

 full feed. 



2. Breeding. — All western lambs carry considerable Merino 

 breeding, but the percentage varies greatly. Those strongest in 

 Merino breeding are very much wrinkled, narrow and leggy, very un- 

 even in their lines, and have white faces and legs. Lambs from western 

 flocks which have used mutton rams extensively are preferred. They 

 are free from wrinkles, more blocky and low-set in form, fairly straight 



Fig. 92.— Good feeder lambs. 



in their lines, and often show brown spots and more or less of a brown 

 coloring on the face and legs. Such lambs are usually thicker fleshed, 

 have greater capacity for feed, and finish more rapidly than those 

 which are especially strong in Merino breeding. Lambs of very in- 

 ferior type, coarse in head and bone, rough in form, or unthrifty and 

 weak in appearance are usually of inferior breeding from flocks where 

 grade or scrub sires are used, and are to be avoided for feeding purposes. 

 3. Form. — Making due allowance for lack of condition, the form 

 desired in the feeder lamb is similar to that desired in the prime lamb. 

 If the front legs "come out of the same hole," as the saying goes, and 

 the form is narrow and decidedly rangy and leggy, the lamb is a slow 

 finisher, though it may make good gains in growth. The wide, deep, 

 moderately compact, fairly low-set, straight-lined, full-middled lamb 

 not only makes the most satisfactory gains and finishes the quickest, 

 but it brings the highest market price when finished. Paunchy lambs 



