AGRICULTURE. 233 
in California is, that in the summer the wool gets full of the 
little burs of the bur-clover, which gives much trouble in wash- 
ing and carding. By sheering early this trouble is to some 
extent avoided. Of course the sheep grow lean in the late 
full, as do the horses and neat cattle, and some of them die of 
starvation. The same remarks may apply to high-blood sheep 
us to other high-blood animals—they must degenerate if they 
get no cultivated food; but the stock may be kept up by cross- 
ing with high-fed bucks of pure blood. 
§ 171. Swine.—Swine are not favorite animals in Califor-_ 
nia. They increase rapidly and are healthy, and their meat 
commands a high price, but they do not thrive upon the dry 
pastures ; they are not permitted to run at large in many coun- 
ties; the mast is scanty in the agricultural counties, and grain 
suitable for feed is dear. It is probable that in a few years 
great numbers of swine will be bred in the tules, the roots of 
which they like to eat; but the tule-lands at present are in 
wide undivided tracts, and the swine which have access to 
them soon get lost. The present number of swine in the state 
is about six hundred thousand. 
§ 172. Poultry—Poultry command very high prices in this 
state, but all attempts to breed them ona large scale, have 
proved unprofitable. Hens are worth from fifty to seventy- 
five cents each, and eggs from twenty-five to fifty cents per 
dozen. Chickens are healthy and increase rapidly in small 
poultry-yards or farms ; but when more than five hundred are 
collected a fatal epidernic appears, and they die off. The dis- 
ease seems to be a kind of apoplexy, for it attacks the fattest 
chickens, and they die suddenly. One large hennery, on the 
French plan, has been established about eight miles frorfi Oak- 
land, and it contains one thousand five hundred hens, with 
accommodations for five thousand. The poultry-yard covers 
four acres of ground, and one acre of it is separated from the 
remainder. The hens lay in the lower story of a frame house, 
which is open on one side. The nests are in a long trough, a 
foot se open on top, and separated into nests by partitions. 
