178 MANAGEMENT AND FEEDING OF SHEEP 



the season of the grazing, the character of the weather 

 and the desire to furnish winter grazing from grass pas- 

 tures. It must be conceded that sheep are fondest of 

 short and tender grazing and that such grazing is good 

 for them. The fact must also be recognized that when 

 grass is eaten very short, it is usually less able to produce 

 so abundantly as when it has more leaf growth. Between 

 these two conflicting facts the flockmaster has to de- 

 termine the course that he must aim to pursue. 



Coarse grazing should, as a rule, be closely grazed 

 for the reason, first, that sheep will not eat it at an ad- 

 vanced stage of growth, and second, that it has greater 

 power to grow when in season than the small and fine 

 grasses. As a rule grazing close in the spring is more 

 allowable than the same in the autumn, as in the spring 

 the season of growth is nearly all yet ahead, whereas in 

 the autumn close grazing leaves the fields so bare that the 

 grasses in the same start but slowly in the spring. Dur- 

 ing seasons that are moist growth is much more vigor- 

 ous than in dry seasons ; hence close grazing is so far 

 more allowable. When winter grazing is to be furnished 

 in abundant quantity, the sheep grazed on the pastures 

 may eat them down in the spring, but they should then 

 be removed during the remainder of the season. Whether 

 sheep and other stock should be grazed together under 

 ordinary conditions of grazing is a question that has given 

 rise to some controversy. The argument may be stated 

 thus : The chief of the reasons against grazing sheep 

 with other stock are: (i) That sheep by their continued 

 movement 'over the pasture soil it more or less, which so 

 far detracts from the relish which cattle have for it. (2) 

 That when the pasture is closely stocked, the sheep are 

 able to get the lion's share of the grazing, because of the 

 close habit of grazing that characterizes them. The cat- 

 tle grazing with them suffer accordingly. (3) When 

 sheep graze with swine, the latter, when the grazing is at 

 all close, soil much of it, so that it becomes ofifensive to 



