APPENDIX O. 421 



the loss in weight of those ewes fed on the mangel over those that had 

 Swedes, whilst the gain in weight of their lambs was much about the 

 same. Hence, I conclude that if ewes are fed with mangel wurzel, they 

 should have them thrown whole to them, either on grass land or in the 

 yard, with plenty of good clover-hay chaff, or they will not do "well ; 

 but this more particularly applies to their use in the early spring months, 

 when they are in a very succulent state; they, however, lose much of 

 this by keeping toward the summer, when their value becomes apparent, 

 as I shall endeavor to show hereafter. » * » » 



"When young lambs are about three weeks old they will begin to 

 eat, and should have some food given them apart from the ewes, or run 

 upon some green food, such as clover, tares, or grass. I generally make 

 a yard or fold with common hurdles (kept very airy and well littered) on 

 my land intended the following summer for turnips, into which I put my 

 ewes when their lambs begin to eat, and let the lambs run through a 

 hurdle set up endwise upon a piece of tares or vetches sown for the pur- 

 pose the preceding autumn. The couples are kept in this way until the 

 pastures intended for them have grown sufBlciently high to carry the 

 number required untU the lambs are weaned. Although some extra 

 expense is incurred by this system ia the use of dry food, a good return 

 is obtained by the outlay, as the clovers and grass, by not bemg stocked 

 early, carry a much greater number of couples during the summer. 

 The usual method is to turn the ewes and lambs upon the clovers and 

 grass as soon as the turnip season is over, allowing them to range indis- 

 criminately over the whole field, which is decidedly a bad practice. I 

 would strongly recommend that part of the field should be fenced Off 

 for the lambs to feed upon apart from their dams, which may be done 

 by setting upright some common hurdles. 



■' MetJwd of Keeping Couples dwring fhe Marty Sumrner Montlis. — In the 

 year 1845 I had a field of land, one side of which was sown with white 

 clover and trefoil, the other side with tares, and a piece of red or broad 

 clover was sown between each. The white clover and the tares were 

 fed off with ewes and lambs in the usual way, the ewes on either part 

 being kept asunder, but the lambs from each lot ran together through 

 the hurdles upon the red clover, which was a good pasture ; they had 

 also a few split beans every day. To ascertain the value of tares against 

 clover and trefoil, for this purpose, I made 



"Experiment No. 4. — From each of the above lots I took a few lambs 

 and weighed them alive twice during the month of May, and found their 

 increase in live weight per month to be as follows : 

 Average gain, in weight, of seven lambs, whose dams were fed lbs. 



on clover and trefoil 20 



The like, whose dams were fed duing the same period on tares . . 16i 

 beiuB a difference ofSJ lbs. each lamb in favor of the clover and 



trefoil.^ * * * * * * . % *„ 



" In the sprmg of 1846, having a considerable quantity of the yellow 

 globe mangel wurzel left on hand, I determined on making a further 

 trial of them as a summer food for sucking ewes, conceiving that they 

 would, when bereft of much of their succulent qualities through keeping, 

 feed sheep better than I found to be the case, as related in experiment 

 No. 3. I, therefore, selected from the flock a few couples in the middle 

 of iwEay ; one part of them were folded in the clover field, and fed with 



