48 Practical Sheep Husbandry 



feeders, healthy and all right, that will do to go out and clean up even 

 wild pasture and do pretty well on it. If the quality of the feeds to 

 be utilized is poor, get something that shows plainly that it has been 

 running on poorer feeds. Of course this will only hold good where 

 sheep or lambs still remain strong, for if they are in a run down, weak- 

 ened condition they must have good feed and care. A good, strong, 

 fleshy set of feeders will gain faster than thinner ones on good feed, 

 but the feed must be good. 



Cattle Ranchman OfiFers Example 



One of the big cattle feeder buyers on this market, who owns a 

 large tract of wild pasture land in Indiana, said to me : "A short while 

 ago a commission firm purchased for one of my neighbors a fleshy set 

 of feeding cattle. These cattle were turned out to graze through the 

 summer on this wild land, and in the fall you would not have known 

 them, for they had gone all to pieces, while our cattle, running in an 

 adjoining pasture made a fine gain and were a set of nice, fleshy feed- 

 ers ready to finish on grain during the winter." 



Better Fall Feeds Provided 



The most successful field feeders have found it expedient to pro- 

 vide more and better field feeds to go along with the ordinary rough- 

 age found on the average farm. Such forage crops as rape, soy beans, 

 field peas, etc., sown in with the corn, or in a field alone, make excel- 

 lent sheep feeds, and sometimes no grain need be added at all ; but this 

 must be watched closely and an added amount of grain given if the 

 sheep are to be marketed when green feed is gone, or the farmer must 

 be prepared with clover or alfalfa hay, corn stover, bean straw or other 

 suitable roughage, and succulent feeds, such as ensilage, roots, etc., to 

 finish them up in a dry lot. 



Noah Fouts, a lamb feeder of Camden, Indiana, writes as follows 

 regarding the merits of soy beans as sheep feed : 



"We turned to sheep several years ago because of the available 

 roughage we saw going to waste every year. We soon learned, how- 

 ever, that this roughage alone would not produce the finish required 

 at the market. We began looking for a supplement for high priced 

 grain and think we have found it in soy beans. We do not claim that 

 we can always finish our sheep or lambs without adding some grain 

 but we have reduced it to a minimum. 



"We have found soy beans a wonderful sheep feed. We generally 

 sow them in with the corn or rape and turn the sheep in on them. We 

 always produce an abundance of clover, alfalfa and soy bean hay as well 

 as corn stover. We have found it imperative to have an abundance of 

 dry roughage for winter feeding. 



"We seldom miss the top of the market and our last load or tail end 

 feeding was good enough to put an extreme top on the lamb market. 

 When feeding in the dry lot, we feed a ration of about equal parts shelled 

 corn and soy beans. We are raising bigger and better crops and have 

 increased the value of our land considerably. We find sheep practical 

 on our high priced land. I strongly caution any one starting in the 



