152 Sheep-Farming 



ence when the lambs arrive. The greatest concern 

 as to the success of a sire is occasioned in selecting 

 the successor to one that has worked a marked 

 improvement in the flock, and the new one should 

 be procured and tested before the older one is dis- 

 posed of. One advantage of a large flock is that 

 when once a ram is found to mate well with the ewes, 

 he can be retained for use with the same ewes so 

 long as both remain useful, and further experiment 

 with that part of the flock is unnecessary, and the 

 superiority of the lambs of such older ewes can be 

 relied upon. 



If the ram selected for the young ewes sired by the 

 older one proves unsatisfactory, a loss is occasioned, 

 but by no means so great a loss as there would have 

 been if all the lambs of that year's crop were by the 

 new sire. In this way, the owner of a large flock has 

 an advantage in being able to breed his ewes to the 

 same ram year after year. He can try them with 

 another according as the character of the previous 

 lambs or the individual characters of the ewes and 

 rams suggest. Even in a flock of less than forty 

 ewes, the extra trouble of keeping an extra ram and 

 of doing the fall mating in two groups would often 

 be repaid many times over by the greater improve- 

 ment secured. Sheep-raising is not likely to prove 

 to be interesting or remunerative unless progress 

 is being made. Progress is a dividend upon what 

 has been put into the venture. In sheep-breeding. 



