DIPS AND DIPPING. 269 



sheep or the lambs of the pests. This devise may be useful 

 in case the regular dipping may not have had its complete 

 desired effect, or the sheep may have picked up a fresh 

 stock of the ticks in any way. 



A word should be said as to the arsenical dips-. These are 

 very effective in use, and safe, except as to one circumstance, 

 which is possible danger to the lambs if they are permitted 

 to join the ewes until the wool has completely drained off. 

 The same may be said in regard to the tobacco dip. 



This, however, is given only as a hint to the owners 

 cf small flocks; it cannot take the place of the regular dip- 

 ping apparatus, or the regular dipping preparations in the 

 market. It may also be of interest to all concerned in re- 

 gard to the lime and sulphur, or sulphide of lime, to mention 

 the fact that the actual experience of a well known wool 

 scouring establishment, in which some wool from sheep 

 dipped in this highly caustic mixture was scoured, and after 

 the finishing was found to be so much injured as to bring less 

 money than the wool of sheep dipped with the other prepara- 

 tions in the market. This is to be expected from the known 

 character of this caustic compound. For whatever will de- 

 stroy the skin, must have a similar result on the fiber, which 

 grows from the skin. This is no new remedy for scab, 

 as it is called, either. It was recommended by a California 

 chemist twenty or thirty years .ago, and was mentioned in 

 the U. S. Agricultural Report of 1876 as a cheap preparation. 

 It is cheap certainly, as to its cost, but experience in Cali- 

 fornia goes to show that in practice it was a very dear- 

 thing. 



Sheep are dipped in troughs arranged in many ways, as 

 the fancy or convenience of those concerned may dictate. 

 For a small flock a trough twelve feet long, eight inches 

 wide at the bottom, and thirty inches at the top, with a suf- 

 ficient depth to cover the sheep except its head, which is 

 held up as it is passed through the trough, the body being sub- 

 merged sufficiently to enable the assistants to thoroughly 

 wash the animal and reach every part of the skin. The dip- 

 ping liquid is kept at a temperature of something over a hun- 

 dred degrees, up to a hundred and ten or twelve, by frequent 

 additions of hot liquid from a heater adjacent to the dipping 

 trough. It is diluted to the right degree in strict accordance 



