THE SHEEP INDUSTRY ON THE MINIDOKA PROJECT. 



13 



and the lamb assisted. If the ewe persists in fighting the lamb, it 

 may be necessary to tie her with a small halter or confine her in a 

 stanchion made by driving two stakes in the ground. Some of the 

 permanent sheds on the project have small stanchions provided in 

 the slats of the hayrack along the wall. It is customary to leave 

 the ewe and her lamb in the pen two or three days, until they get to 

 know each other thoroughly and the lamb becomes strong and active. 

 During this period the ewe should be fed but little grain. After the 

 first few days the ewe and the lamb are turned into the larger pens 

 with other ewes and lambs of the same age, or if the weather is favor- 

 able they are turned into a dry, sunny, wind-protected yard. A few 

 days later they may be turned into the larger yard with the band. 

 Special care should be exercised in keeping the lambing sheds and 

 yards clean. It is not sufficient that the lambing quarters be given 

 the customary one cleaning a year. Each pen should be thoroughly 

 cleaned and disinfected before the ewe and her lamb are placed in it. 

 This is a necessary safeguard to the health of the young lamb, par- 

 ticularly with reference to white scours, from which serious losses 

 sometimes result. 



DOCKING AND CASTRATING. 



The lambs are docked and castrated when they are from one to 

 two weeks old. The work is best done in the morning of a clear, 

 bright day. While it is the general practice to castrate and dock at 

 the same time, it is better to do the docking a few days after the 

 castrating, as the shock of two simultaneous operations is severe and 

 is likely to give the lambs a serious setback. Docking is usually 

 done with a sharp knife. From the results secured by the use of 

 hot docking-irons and pinchers in certain sections of Idaho, it appears 

 that this method should be adopted by sheep growers on the Mini- 

 doka project. It has been ascertained that lambs docked with a hot 



P755RP 



FlG. 2.— Part of a farm flock of sheep on irrigated pasture on the Minidoka Reclamation Project. From 

 6 to 10 ewes and their lambs can be carried through the summer on an acre of this pasture. 



