The Improvement of the Flock 153 



the most important part of the investment is the 

 study and judgment that are brought to bear in 

 making the matings. No lavish expenditures of 

 money for fancy equipment or for breeding animals 

 not adapted to one another or to their conditions 

 can ever give results if skill in mating and developing 

 is lacking. On the other hand, the careful breeder 

 who selects wisely, holds closely to his type, and 

 allows his sheep full opportunity to develop up to 

 the limit of their inheritance will succeed with the 

 use of a very limited amount of capital. 



In-breeding and line-breeding. — The question of 

 mating ewes to rams that are related to them some- 

 times becomes a very practical one. Good breeders 

 disagree as to the advisability of the practice. Its 

 effects are sometimes notably good and at other times 

 as plainly bad. The reason for the difference in 

 results is manifestly due to the particular conditions, 

 as the forces governing inheritance are always the 

 same. 



Robert Bakewell's rule of breeding was to breed 

 "the best to the best." He had no contemporaries 

 and was limited to his own flock for the selection of 

 rams. His success has been referred to in the dis- 

 cussion of the Leicester breed. In the Southdown 

 improvement, John EUi^ian also mated related ani- 

 mals, and owners of some of the prominent flocks of 

 the present day prefer that part of the blood of the 

 ram should be the same as a part of the ewe's blood. 



