A Treatise on Sheep Part 6

"A lamb-house to suckle from one hundred and sixty to one hundred and eighty lambs at a time, should be seventy feet long and eighteen feet broad, with three coops of different sizes at each end, and so constructed as to divide the lambs according to their ages."[19]

[19] Middles.e.x Report, p. 355.

In the county of Wicklow it is the practice to divide the twenty-four hours by four equal periods, and to feed the lambs with ewe's milk and cow's milk alternately. When commencing with cow's milk, a quarter of a pint is given, twice a-day, to each lamb, and this is gradually increased to a pint, exclusive of the milk from the ewe. This method of feeding has been cavilled at, but I think unjustly, as the ewe is thus saved from the bad effects of exhaustion, and the lambs are fit for the butcher when six weeks old, or sooner.

(98.) _Lambing time._ When the ewes begin to drop their lambs, a time which ordinarily happens in the first or second week of April, but which, in other modes of management, must be dated twenty-two weeks after the tupping season, the shepherd has many calls upon his skill and watchfulness. In bad seasons, sheep are apt to prove unkind to their offspring, and none more so than the Cheviots. In this event, the best pastures should be selected for them, or turnips may be carted to them; but as gimmer hogs are often quite incapable of furnis.h.i.+ng the necessary quant.i.ty of milk, the shepherd ought always to be provided with a bottle of milk, which he should drop from his own mouth into that of any lambs which may require it. Such mothers as appear to suffer in bringing forth, should be relieved with the utmost gentleness; and when a miscarriage occurs, if the weather be at the same time unfavourable, the dam ought to receive the shelter of a roof.

When the ewe is lost in yeaning, her lamb, if it survive her, must be reared by another dam. Some little artifice is always necessary to induce a ewe to adopt the offspring of another. Covering the lamb with the skin of her own dead one, is sometimes resorted to, but this is hardly required, as any dam will take to another's offspring if the parties be shut up for some time together. Ewes that are late in lambing should be collected together, so as to be more under the care of the shepherd, and ought to be well fed, for the sake of bringing forward their lambs. Those lambs which are very far behind the rest must be prepared for the butcher, as they would make but a poor figure at the Lammas sales.

(99.) _Was.h.i.+ng._ The time for clipping varies much, being earlier in seasons which have been preceded by favourable weather and an unstinted allowance of food, than in such as have followed a rigorous winter, disease, or any other cause calculated to arrest the growth of wool.

The season may be said to be limited by the middle of May and the middle of July; but this should not be taken as a rule of conduct, the best guide being the state of the new coat, which ought always to be well above the skin before shearing is attempted. The wool, unless among some mountain flocks, is always, in this country, washed prior to its removal from the sheep's back; but in Spain that operation is always deferred till the fleeces have been collected, when they are subjected to a thorough scouring, in public buildings appropriated to the purpose, and termed _lavatories_. This is a plan in many respects superior to ours. Its adoption by our farmers has been recommended by Dr Parry. There cannot be a doubt of its being the preferable mode as regards the saving it would effect in the lives of sheep; but as it is well known that shearing is much facilitated by was.h.i.+ng, and that on the neatness with which the clipping is accomplished the quality of the succeeding crop in a great measure depends, some little time will be necessary to determine the comparative value of either mode. In New South Wales it is customary to make the sheep swim across a stream for two or three mornings before being washed, by which means the yolk is softened, and the removal of grease and dirt much promoted; but this, though a good plan in that mild and even climate, could not be looked upon as safe in a temperature so variable as that of Britain. In cases however, where great nicety is required, the plan in vogue in the former country, that of dipping each sheep, before was.h.i.+ng, into a caldron of warm water, might be beneficially adopted.

Mountain sheep are cleaned by being forced to swim across a pool, but the finer or lowland breeds are washed entirely by the hand. The latter method alone demands a short explanation. Dry, and, if possible, sunny weather, is selected for the operation, on the morning of which the lambs are separated from the flock, and the latter is conveyed to the margin of some pebbly-bottomed pool. Here they are penned or otherwise kept together, while they are seized, one by one, by a man standing mid-thigh deep near the water-edge, and turned back downwards, the head alone being above the surface. Plate V. fig. 1.[20] It is then turned from side to side, and moved backwards and forwards, so as to make the wool catch upon the stream and wave about. When the first washer has held it for a few minutes, and partially cleansed the fleece, he pa.s.ses it _up the river_ to the next, who goes through the same routine, and, on being convinced that the skin is free from filth, compels the sheep to land by swimming in an oblique direction up the water. Three and even four men are sometimes employed in was.h.i.+ng sheep, but two, as here described, will, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, be found sufficient. The bank on which the dripping sheep are collected, should have a clean and firm turf, and the flock should, till fairly dry and fit for shearing, be kept on heavy gra.s.s land, or, what is better, in straw-bedded folds.

[20] For the figures 1, 2 and 3 in Plate V. I am indebted to the _Quarterly Journal of Agriculture_ for 1832, p. 869.

(100.) _Shearing._ After allowing eight days, off or on, to elapse from the time of was.h.i.+ng, so as to permit the wool to gain a fresh supply of yolk, and along with it l.u.s.tre and elasticity, the sheep may be stripped of its fleece. As there is no saving in employing an unskilful clipper, every encouragement should be given to induce servants to cut close, smoothly and evenly, and to avoid injuring the skin, or going twice over the same part. There are two ways in this country of depriving sheep of their wool. In the first, or coa.r.s.er method, which is only adopted in the case of Cheviot and heath sheep, the operator sits upon the ground, and placing the animal on its back between his knees, shears the wool first from the belly and legs, and then, after tying the latter, proceeds to clear the back. In the second method, the legs are never tied, as the disposition of the sheep is such as to render it unnecessary. The animal is placed as in Fig. 2, Plate V., and the shearer clips first one side, cutting from the middle of the belly to that of the back, down to the loins. It is then placed on its side, as in Fig, 3, Plate V., the knee of the operator pressing on its neck, and the wool is removed from the legs and b.u.t.tocks. The fleece is next rolled up, with the cut side outwards, commencing at the tail, and using the wool of the other extremity as a fastening for the bundle.

A cool dry apartment should be selected in which to store the wool, always remembering that _heat_ and _damp_ are equally injurious to it, and that the greater the perfection in which it retains its _natural oily moisture_, the more valuable will it prove both to the grower and the manufacturer.

(101.) _Weaning_, where milking is not practised, ought to be set about in the end of July or beginning of August. In some places the ewe lambs are never speaned, but allowed to go at large with their mothers; and though by this plan the dam is apt to be kept in poor condition, yet is this counterbalanced by the comparative freedom of the hogs from braxy.

As an improvement, however, the gimmer lambs may be withheld for a fortnight from their mothers, and at the end of that time may be permitted to pasture with them. In the few places where the farmer continues to manufacture ewe-milk cheese and b.u.t.ter, speaning is carried into effect somewhat earlier, and is of course attended, in the long run, with no little detriment to the stock and its proprietor. The sooner that the practice be laid aside the better; for though ewe-milk cheese is pretty universally relished and admired, yet those who are acquainted with the scenes which happen at the bughts, know well that the cheese itself cannot but contain much, the mere mention of which would pall at once the appet.i.te even of the least fastidious. In addition to this, a great waste of gra.s.s is occasioned by the sheep going to and from the bught, while the inconveniences they are on every hand exposed to, at a season when they are peculiarly liable to disease and accident, ought of themselves to lead to the abolition of the practice.

When the udders of the ewes appear, after their separation from the lambs, to be much distended, they may be once or twice milked, to prevent bad consequences; but it is much better to obviate the necessity for this, by reducing their allowance of food for a few days.

When the animal seems to suffer much irritation about the udder, it will always be safe to give a brisk dose of any of the common saline purgatives.

The store lambs are at this period sent to good pasture, or, where the farm cannot afford it, are _summered_ at a distance; that is to say, the farmer pays so much a head for permission to feed his flock, during a couple of months, on another person's ground, at the end of which period they are turned upon the pasture which has just been vacated by the gimmers, they having been sent to join the older ewes.

(102.) _Smearing_, in those places where it is still carried on, is performed in two ways, according to the quality of the wool.

_Slipping_, as the one method is termed, is only employed in high, wet districts, where the sheep are covered with long wool; while _rolling_, as the other is usually called, is only required for such as, in dry situations, are surrounded by a short close pile. In pursuing the former plan, the smearer takes up the mixture on the forefinger of his right hand, and while holding the locks of wool apart with his arms and left hand, allows the salve to drop into the groove or shed, along which it is spread by the other fingers.

In _rolling_, a small quant.i.ty only of smearing stuff is raised on the _point_ of the forefinger, with which it is laid evenly upon the skin.

This is by far the neater way of salving, as less of the ointment is permitted to get upon the wool; but as it is altogether a tardier process, it is not so frequently resorted to.

November is the month usually chosen for this operation, but as it cannot be properly done unless the day fixed upon has been preceded by dry weather, the time ought rather to be selected by the aspect of the season.

The composition of smearing stuffs is so very various, that it is quite beyond my power to give the reader even a list of the ordinary ingredients and their proportions; nor need I recommend any of them in particular to the attention of the shepherd, knowing, as I do, the bigoted opinions which are held upon the subject, and the aversion with which every one regards a mixture not of their own composing. I can only observe, that where tar is employed, it ought to be well diluted with grease, so as to enable two English quarts of it to be spread over six sheep. In this way it will be less liable to adhere to the wool, and will be much more readily laid upon the skin. When sheep are salved without due attention to the even spreading of the mixture, the insects with which the skin is infested are, instead of being destroyed, allowed here and there a resting place; and as the severity of their attack is in proportion to the limited nature of their range, the skin at these points soon becomes crusted with scabs. The smaller the quant.i.ty of tar employed, as consistent with the keeping down of vermin, so much the better, as the wool is of more value to the manufacturer, the sheep is saved the discomfort of having its fleece plastered and matted, and the shepherd is spared the vexation of losing lambs through their inability to reach an udder surrounded by locks of hard and tangled wool.

(103.) _Fatting._ The age at which sheep are prepared for the butcher depends upon the breed, its situation, and its propensity to take on fat. The heath sheep may be considered as requiring to be the greatest length of time in the hands of the farmer, and the Leicesters as the reverse; wethers of the former variety being usually disposed off when from three to four years old, and ewes when from four to five; while wethers of the latter kind are fit for market often at eighteen months, and the ewes are in general fed off after the third year.

Sheep, in spring and autumn, are peculiarly liable to diseases of the intestines, a circ.u.mstance mainly to be ascribed to the changes which are, in these seasons, constantly occurring in the nature of their food. Much of this is owing to careless management in the economy of the pastures, and to restricting them for great lengths of time to one kind of provender, a thing guarded against by all good breeders. Sudden transitions, however, from a poor to a nutritive pasture, and the reverse, are always bad, and therefore to be avoided; but change of feeding ground, with these restrictions, cannot be too much inculcated--it is, in fact, the soul of sheep husbandry. The bleakest portions of a farm should be pastured off in autumn, so as to reserve the sheltered spots for winter use. The cast ewes may then be drafted off to feed on a more succulent herbage, previous to being penned on turnips.

Most of the points worthy of attention in sheep feeding having already been detailed in the article on _Crossing_, I shall only add a few particulars in regard to management on turnips.

When sheep are fed on turnips, they are in general confined to a particular portion of the field by nets or hurdles. The latter, when made of Scotch fir, cost about a s.h.i.+lling each; but, when constructed of larch, the price is fourteen-pence. Those made of larch are by far the more durable, and will last three years if kept under cover during summer. Two men are required to set them up, besides a horse and cart to take them to the field, on which account nets have a decided preference, being easy of transportation, and requiring little house-room. Though valuable in windy situations, nets cannot be used to enclose horned sheep, as their heads become entangled with the cords.

They will seldom serve for more than three years, but as they cost only threepence per yard, they may be considered as every way cheaper than hurdles.

When the turnips allotted to the sheep, which seldom exceed a week's supply, are consumed, another portion of the field is enclosed; while the sh.e.l.ls are torn up with a two-p.r.o.nged hook, and either left there to be consumed by the flock, or carted to another field for the use of sheep not then intended to be fattened. A fresh supply should always be afforded them before the old one is eaten clean, otherwise their fattening will be much r.e.t.a.r.ded. It is usual to allow them at the same time plenty of salt, placed up and down the field in troughs or boxes,[21] and about a ton of hay in the ten or fourteen days, to every hundred sheep; though that number, if supplied with what, and permitted to run about, will consume that quant.i.ty in a week. In spring, from half a pound to a pound of oil cake is given daily to each of them, along with turnips.

[21] Old casks, wanting ends, form the best of all contrivances for holding salt for sheep, as when laid on their sides, and retained in that position by stakes, they allow the sheep free admission, at the same time that the salt is defended from rain.

In places where the cold during spring is any way severe, the Swedish turnip ought always to be preferred for feeding sheep, as from the formation of the upper part of the bulb, water cannot collect within it as it does in other varieties, to their serious injury when frost sets in.

Turnips must be cut for such sheep as are shedding their teeth. The mouths of those that refuse to eat them should be examined, that in the event of a tooth being loose or broken it may be removed. Occasionally a sheep will be unable to gnaw a turnip, owing to a peculiar formation of the head, the lower jaw being so very short as to give the profile some resemblance to that of a pig. Such deformed animals are said in this quarter to be _grun_-(ground)-mouthed: I believe from the elongation of the nose suiting them better for poking in the earth than for feeding in the usual way.

The fattening of sheep on turnips is much promoted by their having access to a gra.s.s field, more especially if it happen to contain whins or heather. It is from want of attention to this that sheep are so liable to disease when eating turnips, for, apart from the benefit that accrues to them from a dry lair, they are enabled to turn their food to better account when consuming bitter herbs. It is no unusual thing for turnip-fed sheep and cattle to become quite lean, as the farmers say, "almost at the lifting," for no other reason than that they have been confined too strictly to one article of diet. They have been denied access to plants containing of all things the one most necessary for the maintenance of their health--_bitter extractive matter_--as it is called by chemists--without a due proportion of which the most nutritious substances cannot be turned to account. "As an essential ingredient in the provender of herbivorous animals, it may, I think, be admitted as a fact, that its importance is _in an inverse ratio_ with the nutritive powers of the food."[22] Thus accounting for the length of time that sheep will continue to thrive on turnips alone.

[22] Paris's Pharmacologia, sixth edition, vol. i. p. 147.

With all the advantages, however, which accrue to the sheep when on turnips, from the quant.i.ty of nutritive matter which these roots contain, its progress when restricted to them frequently falls very far short of the expectations of the owner. In the greater number of instances, also, farmers are unable to account for their want of success in this department, so that I may be excused for endeavouring to point out, at some length, the causes of their failure. To proceed:--

The point in sheep management in which our farmers are most deficient, is turnip-feeding; one upon which most will pique themselves as being perfect, though, speaking guardedly, hardly one man in twenty understands the rudimentary principles on which sheep-feeding should be conducted. They are unacquainted with the habits of the wild animal, and, unlike any other cla.s.s of men, interest themselves little in the fundamental study of their calling. There is not a showman, or a bird-fancier, but knows to a t.i.ttle the peculiarities of the creature that he has in charge, and endeavours, to the best of his ability, to provide such food as its instincts crave. Not so, however, with the store-farmer. He cares not to inquire whether the sheep is naturally calculated to subsist on one kind of nutriment; and if so, whether they will, when left to the exercise of instinct, resort to turnips of their own accord; whether the sheep is usually restricted to confined localities similar to our fields, or is the unrestrained rover over an extensive pasture. Yet it is from investigations of this kind that we are to derive our mode of treating sheep, and are to form plans beneficial to ourselves, from their being, in a manner, improvements upon nature. We find, from a perusal of the works of travellers, and from the anatomical peculiarities of the sheep, that it is fitted for residence in countries precipitous in surface, and scantily supplied with herbage; consequently, it must range over a vast extent of ground for a subsistence, and its food must, owing to the varied features of the country, consist, not of one or of a few plants, but of a most extensive mixture of herbage. Experiment also points out that the deductions from these observations are correct. Sheep, in fact, consume a greater number of plants than any other domestic animal. Linnaeus, in examining into this subject, found, by offering fresh plants to such animals, in the ordinary mode of feeding, that horses ate 262 species, and refused 212; cattle ate 276 species, and refused 218; while sheep took 387 species, and only refused 141. We find, too, great difficulty in preventing sheep from springing over the d.y.k.es and hedges that we place as boundaries to their rambling habits, yet how seldom do we see the true cause of their determination to set them at defiance. We may partly account for it by considering their a.n.a.logy to the goat, and their propensity to scale rugged eminences; but I think these movements rather indicate an anxiety to change a pasture already exhausted of variety, for fresh fields, and herbage abounding in that miscellaneous provision which nature apparently reckons essential for them. Shepherds own as much, and will tell you that frequent change of pasture is the soul of sheep husbandry, though they see no reason why sheep should not be kept for many successive weeks on a patch of turnips. They admit the necessity of a frequent s.h.i.+fting in the one case, but deny it in the other. Magendie, a celebrated French physiologist, has shown, by experiment, that it is impossible to keep an animal in a healthy state longer than six weeks on one article of diet, death frequently taking place even before the end of that period; but our sheep-farmers, in happy ignorance of the fact, confine their flocks for months to turnips only. And what, may I ask them, is the consequence of the practice?

Why, that it is not unusual to meet with sheep-owners who lose at least one out of every fifteen, and all owing, as may easily be proved, to this mode of management. In the first place, the turnip is a kind of food entirely foreign to the nature of the sheep, and one to which, at first, they evince great repugnance. There are many varieties of sheep incapable of feeding on turnips, owing to the form of the face, the upper-jaw projecting considerably past the lower, hindering the chisel-shaped teeth from being brought to bear upon the root. None of our British breeds certainly have this as a regular feature, nevertheless they are liable to it; and there are few farmers that have not, several times in their lives, met with _grun-mouthed_ sheep, as they are called in Scotland, from their profile resembling that of the pig, and suiting them for poking in earth, rather than for eating in the usual way. Again, if the structure of the sheep's mouth proves that it is not adapted for eating turnips, the composition of the turnip no less satisfactorily shows that it is not calculated as food for sheep.

Bitterness is essentially necessary in the food of all herbivorous animals; without it, indeed, they sooner or later fall into ill health.

This property is shown by chemists to reside in the extractive matter of plants, which has, therefore, been called _bitter extractive_. The quant.i.ty is also found to be in the inverse ratio of the nutritive powers of the plant; that is to say, where the plant abounds in alimentary matter, the proportion of bitter extractive is small, compared with what it is where the former is deficient. Turnips contain a large quant.i.ty of matter capable of affording nourishment to the body, but they yield little or none of the bitter principle. In consequence of this, sheep acquire fat rapidly for a time, when placed on turnips; but, experiencing a want of the medicinal bitter, begin with equal rapidity to lose the advantages they so recently gained.

Their appet.i.te becomes depraved, and, from being shut out from access to the stomachic intended for them by nature, they take to devouring earth, or any substance capable of serving as a subst.i.tute for it.

"With regard to the natural use of bitter extractive, it may be laid down as a truth, that it stimulates the stomach,--corrects putrefying and unwholesome nutriment,--promotes tardy digestion,--increases the nutritive powers of those vegetable substances to which it is united,--and furnishes a natural remedy for the deranged functions of the stomach in particular, and through the sympathetic medium of that organ, for the atony of remote parts in general."[23] All, indeed, concur in setting a high value on this const.i.tuent of plants--all, with the exception of those whose interests are most deeply concerned in a knowledge of its importance. Farmers, in general, cannot perceive the utility of attending to concerns apparently so trifling, though in the right conduct of these they depend materially for success. Nay, I have known men arguing, that in six weeks they have given ordinary sheep an excellent coating of fat, by keeping them on turnips only; though, on strict inquiry being made into the nature of the field in which they had been penned, it has always turned out that the sheep had access to other things, their owners having wilfully shut their eyes to the true circ.u.mstances of the case. Depend on it, no sheep will continue in health during six weeks on turnips alone, much less will it continue throughout that time to take on fat. Much of the mischief attending a want of bitter matter is obviated by the plan of allowing the sheep corn, salt, oilcake, and hay, which, serve, especially the last, as tolerable subst.i.tutes for it. Good hay ought always to be plentifully supplied to sheep on turnips, as, from the variety of the plants composing it, it contains much that is not to be found in turnips.

Besides, one of the most useful bitters with which we are acquainted (the _Bogbean--Menyanthes Trifoliata_) occurs in meadow hay, and is a plant sufficient of itself to save the animal from the consequences of neglect. Whenever you hear of remarkable instances of sheep becoming quickly fat on turnips, you may safely believe they have had liberty to nibble something in addition to the ordinary provender. They have had access to broom or whins, perhaps only to bushes that are laid as a defence on d.y.k.es, or only to the scanty pickings on the edges of fields--still they have by such means in a manner satisfied the craving for bitter aliment, and enabled their stomachs to turn to better account the otherwise unprofitable turnips. Broom is at all times an excellent medicine for sheep, and one which they are partial to, and which ought, therefore, to be placed, if possible, within their reach.

[23] Paris's Pharmacologia, vol. i. p. 146.

CHAPTER VI.

ACCIDENTS AND OPERATIONS.

(104.) Sheep being about as liable as other animals to a variety of accidents, it is necessary that the shepherd should possess a competent knowledge of the means which art affords for the remedy of those mishaps. It is from a want of such knowledge that farmers are frequently led to slaughter valuable sheep, though only labouring under the effects of some commonplace disease or accident. If the animal is attended by a professional person, an expense is sure to be incurred nearly equal to the worth of the patient, and in so far as they endeavour to obviate this, by killing the sheep, they are free from blame; but why not rather contrive to save the cost of veterinary attendance, by making themselves conversant with its diseases, and able to prescribe for their own flocks, in which there can be no difficulty, as the remedies are, in the majority of cases, few, simple, and of easy application. In the surgical and medical management of flocks, much mystery has, as in other matters, all along existed; but that fantastic age is well nigh its close, and thanks to the spirit of candid inquiry now abroad, we may hope ere long to boast of valuable information in this department. The spread of correct ideas regarding the nature and treatment of accidents and diseases, has from first to last been prevented by the diffuseness of those who have written on the subject, and by their so clothing it in a ma.s.s of verbiage, as to render scarcely intelligible what would otherwise be easy of acquirement. To obviate the liability to a similar charge, the following observations are given as briefly as is consistent with a due regard to the importance of the subject.

(105.) _Wounds._ All the wounds which can be inflicted may be cla.s.sed under the heads of incised, punctured, and lacerated.

An incised wound is one made by a cutting instrument, such as a knife or a piece of gla.s.s.

Punctured wounds are those produced by sharp pointed bodies, such as pins or thorns.

Lacerated wounds are those occasioned by blunt bodies, as the teeth of the dog, tearing rather than cutting the flesh.

When a sheep has received any of these injuries, the following rules ought to be attended to, and in the order here recommended:--

1st. Arrest the bleeding, if profuse, and likely to endanger life.

2d. Clip away the wool for a few inches around the injured part.

3d. Remove dirt or other foreign body from the wound.

4th. Bring the separated parts as nearly together as circ.u.mstances will at the moment permit, and retain them there by suitable apparatus.

(106.) _To stop Bleeding._ Bleeding will, if no large arteries are divided, cease on the free exposure of the surface for a few minutes to the air; but when a large vessel has been cut, more determined means must be had recourse to. Pressure on the bleeding surface and its neighbourhood will in many cases succeed, but this or any similar method is far inferior to that of securing the open vessel by a thread.