Experiences of the Severe Winter of 1890-91. 297 
Throughout the grass counties the crop of lambs was under 
the average, and the mortality amongst both ewes and lambs 
has been heavy. On many farms during the sharp weather the 
ewes suffered from want of a sufficient allowance of nutritive 
food. A foddering of poor hay once or twice a day, whilst the 
land was covered with snow, was totally insufficient to main- 
tain their condition, hence as the lambing season approached 
the ewes were found to be weak and low in condition, whilst 
their milk was scanty in quantity and poor in quality. Until 
the rain came at the end of April the old pastures and seed 
layers were perfectly bare, the ewes chiefly depending on trough 
food. The lambs are stunted in growth, and the wool is dry, 
denoting an unprogressive state. 
The loss on a stock farm by the failure or destruction of the 
root crop cannot be measured by the mere value of the crop, 
though this is considerable. The stock of the farm has to be 
reduced, and placed on the market at unsuitable seasons, and in 
an unfit state, whilst the nnimals that are left on the farm are 
only carried through at great cost. The loss of a root crop deterio- 
rates the manurial condition of the land, the effect of which is 
felt throughout the whole rotation. On an average, we estimate 
the loss on a stock-breeding and rearing farm — the roots were 
up and stored during the autumn of 1890 — at from 5/. to 61. 
per acre on the area of the root crop. 
The depreciation in the value of store sheep during the 
spring of 1891, due to the loss of the root crop, has been most 
serious. Throughout the gi-eat turnip-growing districts of the 
Southern and Eastern Counties thousands of half-ripe sheep 
have been slaughtered, entailing a heavy loss on the farmer, 
whilst greatly lessening the future output of mutton. As regards 
the tegs that have been carried on through the winter and spring, 
when the cost of artificial foods has been deducted tlie balance will 
be less than their value last November, whilst breeding ewes are 
worth less by 15s. to 20.?. per head than they were at the above 
date. Throughout the turnip-growing districts of England the 
numbers of sheep have considerably diminished. 
The ordinary forage crops were for the most part cut down 
by the severity of the winter, and the bleak weather of the spring 
has had the effect of retarding vegetation. Rye, winter oats, and 
tares, were probably never in so backward a state as they were 
at the beginning of May. We have, however, learnt a useful 
lesson, which I trust will not be readily forgotten — that is, that 
of all forage crops cultivated for spring food none is so hardy as 
the kale tribe, which in normal seasons produces a large amount of 
valuable food ; its recuperative powei's are of the utmost value to 
VOL. n. T. s. — 6 X 
