15 
The bedding grounds on which the sheep ‘“‘ bed down,” as it is called, 
are Selected on a dry, jevel, or gently sloping, smooth area. At dusk 
the sheep come in, crowding and bleating and raising a cloud of dust. 
They gradually arrange themselves and one by one they lie down, close 
together, and little by little the bleating grows less till they all are 
Silent and asleep. 
At the end of a week, commonly, sometimes two weeks or sometimes 
only two or’three days, the feed within easy range of camp is exhausted 
and the camp is moved to a new place. This moving of camp is 
repeated from time to time all summer, some of the bands in suitable 
Situations remaining in one general locality, others making long circuits 
over a much larger territory. A particular piece of ground 1s usually 
grazed over only once, as a second grazing is seldom of any value. If, 
however, the first grazing is sufficiently early in the season a fresh 
growth may follow and furnish an excellent second crop. In general, 
the progress of camps during the season is from the base of the moun- 
tains toward their summits, keeping pace with the growth of the 
vegetation that follows the melting of the snow. 
LOSS OF SHEEP DURING THE SUMMER. 
From various accidental causes a few sheep in a band are usually 
lost during the summer, a loss of 1 per cent being common. Occa- 
sionally larger losses occur. The principal causes of death are bears, 
wolves, falling rocks, poisonous plants, and lightning. Grizzly bears 
come at night and usually kill several sheep at a visit. The only 
wolves of the higher mountains are the large timber wolves. They 
kill few sheep during the summer, but in the autumn, just about the 
time the sheep are leaving the mountains, they begin to run in packs 
and are more bold. A late band of sheep sometimes suffers a severe 
loss from this source. On steep, rocky mountain slopes a sheep is fre- 
quently killed by a rolling rock loosened by some sheep grazing on a 
higher part of the slope. Sheep are sometimes killed by eating water 
hemlock (Cicuta vagans), larkspur (Delphinium), rhododendron (khodo- 
dendron californicum), or laurel (Umbellularia californica). The first 
two are herbaceous plants growing at low elevations on the eastern 
slope of the Cascades, usually below the timber. In the spring of 1897 
about 200 sheep died in a band that had been grazed in a great patch 
of larkspur on one of the western spurs of the Tygh Hills in Wasco 
County. The other two plants are, respectively, a shrub and a small 
tree that grow on the humid western slopes in the forests. Rarely a 
band of sheep, driven to cover in a storm, is struck by lightning with 
serious results. In July, 1896,168 sheep were killed in this way ina 
thunderstorm on Crane Prairie. The sheep had huddled together for 
shelter from the rain in a little grove of lodge-pole pines, where they 
were struck by two successive lightning bolts. 
