300 MANAGEMENT AND FEEDING OF SHEEP 



Wherever sheep are shorn it should be under cover, 

 to protect the shearers and also to protect the sheep, espe- 

 cially when the shearing is done in warm weather. Then 

 they should be housed in quarters adjacent to the shear- 

 ing floor, so as to be convenient to the shearers. They 

 should thus be penned in lots, sufficient to supply the 

 shearers for the day, and they should be thus congregated 

 when free from dew and rain. They should be kept in 

 clean quarters, to prevent the soiling of their wool. When 

 the shearing continues for successive days, much attention 

 must be given to keeping the quarters clean, and the 

 necessity for such watchfulness is greater when the sheep 

 have been washed. 



When a small band of sheep has been washed, they 

 may be readily penned for shearing in the end of a lane. 

 Green grass will answer for a shearing floor, and a few 

 boards extended across the corner or nook of the fences 

 that come together there, will form a sufficient protection 

 for the shearers. 



Methods of shearing sheep — Sheep are shorn by hand 

 and by the aid of machinery. Machine shearing, which is 

 of comparatively recent introduction, is destined to sup- 

 plant hand shearing wherever shearing is to be done in a 

 large way. It not only does the work more expeditiously, 

 but it does better work and neater than is done by the 

 average shearer, and when sheep are shorn in large lots, 

 it is done more cheaply than when done with the shears. 

 Two methods of hand shearing are followed. One of 

 these is known as the long method and the other as the 

 round method. 



When sheep are shorn by the long method, the 

 shearer begins by removing the wool from the head. He 

 then opens the wool on the throat and shears from the 

 underline of the same to the top of the neck. This is con- 

 tinued until a point is reached at or near the shoulder 

 blade. The position of the sheep is then reversed, and the 

 wool is then removed from the other side of the neck. A 



