1867. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



207 



ecutive committee, consisting of tlio prcsiilent and : 

 secretary of the society, nud Messrs. Anderson of 

 Me., Smith of N. H.,"Birnie of Mass., Fcarcc of 

 R. I., Clark of Vt., and Sumner of Ct., were order- i 

 cd to negotiate with the Rhode Island society, or 

 any other simihir association, for holding an cxlii- 

 bition next autumn. 



KAISINQ LAMBS. 

 Wishing to compare Lis own practice with 

 that of other breeders of merino sheep, Dr. 

 Randall addressed a series of questions to 

 quite a number of the leading farmers in New 

 York and Vermont. We select from the Rural 

 Neio Yorker the following summary of answers 

 to these questions upon the following timely 

 topics : — 



Attention to Lambing Ewes. — It is scarcely 

 necessary to specify separately the practices of 

 each of our correspondents in this particular. 

 Those having the most valuable sheep visit 

 lambing ewes constantly during the day, late 

 in the evening and early in the morning. Some 

 visit them once in two hours during the night, 

 and if a ewe is found about to yean, watch her 

 until she has done so and the lamb is taken 

 care of. The amount of attention required 

 depends much on the state of the weather. 

 Unless sheep are very tame and accustomed to 

 see the shepherd and his light, it is much bet- 

 ter for him to keep away from them in the 

 night. Otherwise the lambs will be run over 

 or separated from their dams in the resulting 

 ponfusion, and young ewes'will sometimes take 

 no pains to look them up again ; and young 

 ewes frightened away or disturbed, soon after 

 yeaning, are much more likely to disown their 

 lambs. 



Condition of the Udder. — All our corres- 

 pondents but two express themselves in favor 

 of cxaminuig the ewe's udder, at the time of 

 lambing, to see what is its condition, and tliat 

 the milk flows freely. The teat is often 

 stopped at the lower end and requires consid- 

 erable pressure by the fingers, wetted with 

 milk or spittle, to force out what some of our 

 farmers term the "plug." Mr. Pitts does not 

 examine the udder if the lamb is strong enough 

 to suck. Wilcox omits the examination for a 

 few hours to avoid unnecessarily disturbing or 

 exciting the ewe. These differences are proba- 

 bly rather apparent than real. If the lamb 

 helps itself at the outset, sucking and obvious- 

 ly obtaining milk from both sides of the udder, 

 and obtaining enough of it, no one would feel 

 called on to interfere ; if not, and especially if 

 the weather is cold and the lamb betrays weak- 

 ness, the examination %vould not be long de- 

 ferred by any one. Our own views on the 

 subject are fully given at p. 146 of the Practi- 

 cal Shepherd, and it is not worth while to take 

 lip room to repeat them here. We consider 

 the ol)jection to disturbing ewes unncccssarilji, 

 especially young ones, worthy of attention ; for 



we have repeatedly seen a ewe with her first 

 lamb, run away from and betray great indiffer- 

 ence to it for some time afterwards, if disturbed 

 while licking it dry. We would meddle with 

 no ewe while licking her lamb dry, and while 

 the latter was vigorously making Its first efforts 

 to sack, if in anything like a comfortable tem- 

 perature. 



First Milk. — One question to our corres- 

 pondents was : — "If the milk is thick and gum- 

 my do you milk it out on the ground, or let 

 the lamb take it .s^' Baker, A. H. Clapp, Greg- 

 ory, Ileyne, Pitts and Pol tie have the lamb 

 take it. Brown and Wright milk a little on 

 the ground and then have the lamb take it. 

 E. O. Clapp milks it on the ground if In abun- 

 dance, if not, lets the lamb take it if it can. 

 Elithorp milks it on tlie ground if very thick 

 and gummy, so as to be difficult to draw, but 

 if it comes easy lets the lambs take it. Ham- 

 mond milks it on the ground and suckles the 

 lamb on another ewe "until the milk becomes 

 good." The Marslialls let the lamb draw it 

 If he can. Rich milks it out once. Sanford, 

 If it is quite thick, milks it out, but likes to 

 have the lamb take it as soon as he can. Sax- 

 ton first lets the lamb draw a little, and then 

 milks out the bag clean on the ground. Wil- 

 cox lets the lamb take it if he will, but if not, 

 after a few hours milks it out. Our practice 

 has conformed to that of the Marshalls, which 

 Is substantially the same with that of Elithorp, 

 Sanford and ail those who say they let the 

 lamb take it ; for we suppose none of them 

 mean to be understood that they draw it by 

 hand from the udder and feed it from a spoon, 

 or the like, to the lamb. If, as sometimes occurs, 

 the milk has that thick, gluey consistency 

 which renders it impossible to be drawn by 

 the lamb. We do not think it well, however, 

 for a weak lamb at least, to have a continued 

 surfeit of this thick, first milk, if it physics it 

 too freely. It is, as Mr. Pottle remarks, "Na- 

 ture's cathartic." Few ewes continue to give 

 It too long, but we have />een instances of the 

 kind. 



The Coxsumption of Wool. — We learn 

 from Washington that a statement made to the 

 Senate Committee on Agriculture declares that 

 the annual consumption of unscoured wool In 

 the United States is little more than one-third 

 of the estimate in the special report. It makes 

 the total wool supply for the four years ending 

 June, 1865, amount to 800,000,000 pounds, 

 300,000,000 of which were produced here, 

 279,000,000 imported, and 220,000,000 intro- 

 uced as manufactured woolens. 



^^ A company has been formed in Meriden, 

 Conn., for the manufacture of hats by a ma- 

 chine which weaves them whole. Their capital 

 stock is $400,000, and it took $75,000 to buy 

 up the different patents used in the machine. 



