SHEEP HUSBANDRY IN SOUTH CAROLINA. 301 



do it here. Allow eighty lambs to one hundred ewes, and you have from 

 five hundred ewes, four hundred lambs ; deduct one-tenth for deaths, and 



You have 360 at $1, J3G0 00 



Charge 20 cents per head for 900 sheep, makes • - - 180 00 



Charge for shepherd, 150 00 — 330 00 



liambs over-pay expenses by $30 00 



All these calculations are made on the supposition that sheep get a par* 

 of that regular attention which all farmers give to their other domestic ani 

 mals. And to make sheep husbandry successful, it is not only necessary 

 that this attention should be given, but every one who attempts it shouL 

 Icnow something of their diseases and the cures, and also the summer and 

 (vinter management. This can be acquired only by their own, or the ex- 

 perience of others. Easy access can be had to the experience of northern 

 wool growers, who are proverbial for being close observers. They say the 

 disease called the " scours" is the principal one to which sheep are liable, 

 produced by excess of rich green food, and cured easily by a change to 

 dry, but if allowed to continue, is fatal. 



From the introduction into the United States, in 1608. of Merino sheep 

 from Spain, owners of this stock have considered it of the first importance 

 to preserve the quality and quantity of their fleece, and if possible, to im 

 prove both. They ascertained that lambs from young a.*)*! healthy sires 

 improved, while those from old ewes fell back both in quality m\d quantity 

 of fleece. 



Among them it is now a settled practice not to breed fi'om ewes over 

 seven or eight, nor from bucks over six years old. It is very important tc. 

 resort to the evidence of age the teeth afTord. Their books have been par 

 ticular in describing these evidences, which I will copy : "During the first 

 year, lambs have eight small teeth in front, in the upper jaw, called nippers j 

 at a year old, the centre two shed, and two larger teeth take their place. 

 At two years old, the next two are lost, and supplied by two larger ones. 

 Thus losing and being supplied by two larger ones annually, till five — then 

 they have a full set. At eight or nine they begin to lose their nippers — two 

 every year — and by thirteen or fourteen years old, they have lost their 

 entire set." 



It is evident that during the time ewes are losing their teeth, they become 

 less and less able to supply themselves with food, consequently afford less 

 and less milk for their young. Thus the degeneracy is accounted for. In 

 Vermont, where wool is as much their staple as cotton in South Carolina, 

 so important do they consider it not to breed from ewes after they begin to 

 lose teeth, that although mutton is not used by the inhabitants for the table, 

 they sell their old stock to be fed to hogs. 



In most of the other northern states, their ewes at that age are kept from 

 the bucKs, and fattened for market. From their known skill in managing 

 well what they undertake, we may safely take their usage as a guide, when 

 it is applicable to our situation. With them grass is the entire food of theii 

 flocks — green meadows for summer pasture and hay for winter. Their win- 

 ters require five months' constant feeding, during which they estimate each 

 sheep to consume fifty cents worth of hay. All stock is then kept enclosed, 

 uiid the attention to turning sheep to pasture in summer, and feeding sheep 

 in winter, requires but little labor in addition to their other stock. 



Flocks require close attention but at three times in the }?ear — the tuppmg, 

 the lambing, and shearing seasons. Ewes go with lamb one hundred and 

 twenty-five days, or five months, and they so manage as to have the lambs 



