SHEEP FEEDING. 105 



animals were scarcely strong enough to drive from the railroad 

 station to the college farm. They weighed an average of 42^/2 

 pounds each and were a mixed lot of ewes and lambs, with Merino 

 blood predominating. These were designated as the "locoed" sheep. 

 These latter two lots were fed in co-operation with the chemical de- 

 partment and in a bulletin, soon to be issued from that department, 

 full details in regard to the study of the individual sheep and the 

 treatment and deductions drawn from the experiment during the 

 summer and winter will be given. Our plan was to find out what 

 results could be obtained from feeding this class of sheep as com- 

 pared to a fairly good class of wethers, using these latter as a basis 

 for comparison. 



PLAN OF THE EXPERIMENT. 



The three kinds of sheep were divided into two lots each. The 

 "poison plant" sheep contained 32 in each lot. In lot one was 

 the stronger and heavier sheep and in lot two the lighter and pre- 

 sumably weaker sheep. Lot one received clover hay and one 

 pound of grain per day as a maximum grain ration. Lot two re- 

 ceived clover hay, i pound of grain per day and */2 pound of roots 

 per day as a maximum ration. The "locoed sheep" were also di- 

 vided into two lots. The first called, lot 3, was made up of the 

 stronger sheep, and the second, called lot 2, was made up of the 

 lighter and weaker sheep, our plan being to feed those sheep so as 

 to encourage, if possible, the lighter sheep through our method of 

 feeding. Lot 3 received clover hay, I pound of screenings a day 

 and y 2 pound of roots as a maximum ration. Lot 4 received the 

 same ration except that mixed grain was substituted in place of the 

 screenings. The grain for both the ' 'poison-plant" and "locoed" sheep 

 was crushed coarsely. The 100 wethers were also divided into 

 two lots, 50 in a lot, and they were divided as nearly equal as pos- 

 sible, considering the weight and quality of the sheep. The first, 

 known as lot 5, received clover hay and i l /> pound of grain per day 

 and the 2d, known as lot 6, received clover hay and i Ib. of grain a day 

 Our purpose in this was to get a comparative test of the effect of 

 the lighter or heavier grain ration. For these sheep the grain was 

 fed whole. The grain fed consisted in every case of a mixture of 

 } _ barley, \/\ oats and l /^ bran, by weight. The clover hay was a 



