STOCK-POISONING PLANTS OP THE RANGE. 23 



eat everything in their course, and, because of jealousy, will take 

 particular pains to get every available plant. If, on the other hand, 

 they are kept in loose order and spread widely over the range, they 

 are much less likely to eat any poisonous plant. 



This applies equally well to lupine poisoning. When sheep are 

 allowed to feed freely upon a lupine patch and are moved without 

 any haste, no harmful results will occur. If, however, they are 

 massed together and driven in close formation over such a patch, 

 they are almost certain to be poisoned if the plants are in pod at the 

 time. A large number of specific instances have been noted. At 

 one place in Idaho, for instance, where losses have occurred repeatedly, 

 it was found that the sheep were trailed in a narrow space through a 

 patch of lupine. The remedy in such cases clearly is to see that the 

 sheep, when it is necessary to trail them through a patch of lupine, 

 are drifted rather than driven, and that they are well fed when they 

 come upon this locality. It seems probable that intelligent handling 

 of bands of sheep may reduce to almost nothing the losses occasioned 

 by Zygadenus and lupine. If, however, hungry sheep come in con- 

 tact with fields of Zygadenus in the spring, or with fields of lupine 

 in the late summer and fall, at a time when the plants are bearing 

 pods, fatal results must be expected. 



In one locality in Oregon an instance of this character occurred in 

 the summer of 1914, when something like 4,000 sheep which had been 

 driven rather rapidly along a trail where forage was scarce were 

 turned into a 10-acre pasture on which there was little but sagebrush 

 and lupine, the lupine at that time being in pod. About 400 out of 

 the 4,000 sheep died. Similar instances might be cited in a large 

 number of places. Sometimes successive bands of sheep are driven 

 over a trail, several going without any loss whatever; then one band 

 may suffer heavily, while others folio whig are not harmed. The 

 explanation of these cases seems to be that the first animals going 

 over the trail avail themselves of all the useful forage. The succeed- 

 ing animals, finding nothing suitable for food, take the poisonous 

 plants, which may be wild cherry or lupine, or, in the case of cattle, 

 larkspur. The animals which are poisoned may exhaust the supply, 

 even of the poisonous plants, so that succeeding bands are not 

 poisoned and get across the trail safely provided they do not fall 

 from actual starvation. 



It follows from these facts that it is very undesirable to keep sheep 

 for any length of time upon the same bedding ground. This has 

 been shown to be bad for the range on general principles, but it is 

 also rather risky for the sheep themselves, for if animals go out from 

 the same place day after day and return at night they will eat every- 

 thing that is available along the route. In such cases, if there are 

 poisonous plants to be obtained, the animals are pretty apt at some 



