-cive sufficient exercise to give him a good appetite and keep him in 

 vigorous physical condition. Rams are more often injured as 

 jeders from lack of exercise than from any other cause. Old rams 

 dll not exercise sufficiently if fed too much grain. A ram should 

 rver become fat. During the winter he can be turned out into a yard 

 id allowed to eat his grain and roughage strewn on a smooth surface, 

 turned out in a field to hustle for dead weeds and grass. In the 

 ly spring he may be placed on pasture, but must be kept under 

 iclter at night to prevent pneumonia. An orchard is an ideal place 

 the ram during the summer months. 



Feeding the Ram. 



Experience of practical breeders demonstrates that a ram, to be 

 ipt in good physical condition, must be fed feeds with a liberal sup- 

 of protein and mineral matter. Because of its deficiency in both 

 these constituents, corn should never be fed as a sole grain feed to 

 ram, except when fed with legume hay in limited amounts. The 

 lount of grain fed will depend upon the condition of the ram, the 

 season of the year and the roughage fed. 



During the winter months the grain for a ram should not exceed 

 one pound daily. In the spring of the year, feed no grain if the pas- 

 ture is good and the ram is in good physical condition. In August 

 the following grain mixtures are recommended for fitting the ram 

 >r the mating season : equal parts of oats and wheat bran ; two parts 

 talfa meal and one part corn ; equal parts of corn and oil meal ; equal 

 irts of Canadian field peas and oats, or equal parts of corn, oats, 

 r heat bran, and oil meal. 



The object should be to get the ram into as vigorous a condition 

 possible for the mating season, as his energies will be drained 

 that time. A mature ram weighing 150 to 200 pounds should eat 

 >ut two pounds of grain daily during the breeding season. How- 

 *er, it is very easy to get the ram to consume too much grain, and 

 that will injure his activity as a breeder. A vigorous ram averages a 

 higher per cent, of lambs that are strong and vigorous at birth. A 

 ram that is not vigorous may become sterile before the ewes of the 

 flock have all been bred. "Ewes bred early in the season of mating 

 to a single ram dropped a larger percentage of lambs than those near 

 the latter end of the season." 29 



Succulent feed should be available at all seasons of the year. The 

 in England and Scotland, whence our mutton breeds have come, 



29 Wisconsin Bulletin 95. 



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