20 TEXAS AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. 



cross averaged 12.3 per cent, shrinkage, while the Hampshire cross 

 showed a small shrinkage. 



When the lambs were offered on the Fort Worth live stock market 

 January 20, the packers did not discriminate against any of the dif- 

 ferent pens of the cross-bred lambs. After handling them carefully 

 they declared them all to have an equal amount of finish with one kind 

 just as valuable to the packer as the other. The high price of $9.90 

 per hundredweight was paid for the entire shipment, there being cnly 

 one 60-pound Rambouillet cull taken out and sold on the market for 

 6 cents per pound. 



The average sales receipts of the lambs are set forth in the last column 

 of Table 3. In this table it will again be observed that the Lincoln 

 cross stood first, with the Hampshire cross 22 cents behind, the South- 

 down being at the foot of the list. 



Table 4 is similar to Table 3, the only difference being that 

 the latter had to do with the weights, gains, shrinkages, dressing per- 

 centages, etc., of the thirty-six lambs held back for the National Feeders' 

 and Breeders' Fat Stock Show in March. By referring to Table 4, 

 it will be observed that the Hampshire cross made the largest gain 

 during the period January 5 to March 8, with the Karakule cross a 

 close second and the Lincoln third, all three crosses showing a gain in 

 excess of one-half pound per head daily. 



The lambs were weighed at the feed lots March 8, and the Lincoln 

 cross weighed 1.3 pounds more than the Hampshire cross. It is in- 

 teresting to note, however, that after being shipped to Fort Worth and 

 placed on exhibition at the Fat Stock Show for a week the Hampshires 

 showed a smaller shrinkage than the Lincolns, the Hampshire show 

 lambs averaging five pounds more to the packers than the Lincolns. 



By observing closely the tabulation in Table 4, under shrinkage, 

 it will be noted that the shrinkage of the Shropshire, Hampshire, and 

 Southdown crosses is very low. In spite of the fact that the figures in 

 this table show such a low shrinkage, the dressing percentages of these 

 low shrinkage lambs are correspondingly low which only goes to show 

 that there must have been an error committed somewhere in the weigh- 

 ing of the lambs to the packers. The Lincoln cross dressed 52 per cent., 

 and the judge who made the awards well knew that so far as finish is 

 concerned there was but very little difference between the fleshing qual- 

 ities of the Lincoln, Hampshire, and Southdown lots. 



LINCOLN-RAMBOUILLET CROSS FIRST IN PEN OF FAT LAMBS CONTEST. 



The six pens of Experiment Station lambs were entered in the pen 

 of five fat lambs contest, and in what was the best lamb contest ever 

 pulled off at the National Feeders' and Breeders' Show. The respective 

 pens of fat lambs exhibited by the Texas Experiment Station were placed 

 in the following order: 



First Lincoln-"Rambouillet cross. 

 Second Hampshire-Rambouillet cross. 



