350 The Feeding of Animals 



Sheep occupy a peculiar place on the farm in that 

 they will accommodate themselves to pasturage that 

 is not adapted to cows and horses, and will utilize 

 some kinds of rough fodder not readily eaten by other 

 farm animals without submitting it to somewhat ex- 

 pensive methods of preparation. If it were not for 

 the discouragement which sheep husbandry has received 

 from the depredations of dogs, sometimes real and 

 sometimes greatly overestimated or even imagined, 

 the production of wool and mutton would greatly in- 

 crease on the hill farms of this country, with undoubted 

 profit to eastern agriculture especially, where soil fer- 

 tility needs strengthening in every possible way. 



THE NATURE AND EXTENT OF THE GROWTH IN FAT- 

 TENING SHEEP 



The character of the animal that is fattened for 

 mutton varies within wider extremes than in steer 

 feeding. This is due chiefly to the greater range in 

 maturity of the former, from the two months' lamb to 

 the mature wether. There are corresponding differences 

 in the nature of the increase while fattening, accord- 

 ing as the animal is young and making growth of all 

 parts of the body or is simply storing fat in the mature 

 organism. The character of the body substance stored 

 probably is also influenced by the stage in the fatten- 

 ing period, whether at the beginning when the animal 

 is thin or near the end when a fat sheep is becoming 

 fatter. The only definite data which can be presented 

 relative to the composition of the increase of fattening 



