428 SHEEP INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES 



and sold in the fall and winter as high as $4 to $16, But the system 

 that has been carried to great success in the State is that of raising 

 both early lambs and fattening for fall mutton. Nowhere are sheep 

 and early lambs handled with such profit and the return made so 

 quickly. 



It was fortunate for the sheep husbandry of the State that the far- 

 mers saw, at an early day, that there was more profit in mutton that 

 was always in some demand than in wool which sometimes would not 

 sell, and when they abandoned their Merino flocks the abandonment 

 was permanent and absolute. Their nearness to the large markets of 

 New Tork and Philadelphia gave a permanency to the demand for mut- 

 ton that could not be exijected of wool. 



The marked growth of the mutton industry in the State may be fixed 

 at about 1830. In the years following many Leicester sheep were grown 

 in the State and fattened for market. In after years the Southdown 

 came in and remained the favorite. The greatest development of the 

 Southdown was made by J. 0. Taylor, of Holmdel, Monmouth County. 

 Mr. Taylor began raising sheep in 1834, following the custom then in 

 vogue of buying a few sheep from drovers that came along in early au- 

 tumn with flocks from New Tork, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, of the char- 

 acter of the ordinary sheep of those States, in which fine wool and a 

 light carcass formed the predominating element. These were bought 

 from the drovers, and with a few steers, also purchased in the fall, were 

 carried through the winter mostly upon coarse feed, such as cornstalks, 

 grazed and fattened through the summer and then disposed of to make 

 room for a new supply. Lambs were sold in the spring, but they were 

 not a primary consideration. In 1848 Mr. Taylor came to the conclu- 

 sion that an improvement could be made upon this system by which 

 butchers' lambs could be bred more profitably by the introduction of 

 better blood on the part of the sire, to secure greater size and earlier 

 maturity in the ofi"spiing. He purchased some Southdown rams in 

 1848 that had been prize-takers at the American Institute show, and 

 found this cross upon the common ewes fully as advantageous in every 

 respect as had been anticipated. The neighbors had to keep up with 

 his improvement, consequently he had a ready local demand for all the 

 pure Southdown lambs he could spare. Eam lambs, purchased by them 

 at $15 each, were found to more than repay their cost in the increased 

 value of the butchers' lambs. From $6 to $7 advance upon each ewe 

 purchased in fall with this system was realized by the best farmers — 

 say, $4.50 for the lamb, $1 profit on the ewe by fall, and$l for the wool. 

 Mr. Taylor and the best farmers fed the ewes about three months with 

 half a pint daily of corn meal, together with hay and cornstalks, but 

 some gave good clover hay only. They were allowed to run on grass 

 as soon as it gave a good bite and the lambs were sold when ten to fif- 

 teen weeks old. The earliest lambs from this Southdown cross dressed 

 from 50 to 55 pounds, but at three months or over 70 pounds. The 



