SHEEP STEALING.

Feilding Star, Volume XVII, Issue 154, 31 December 1895, Page 2

SHEEP STEALING.

Skvebal farmers in the Kiwitea and adjacent districts, have bad reason to complain lately of their flocks having been diminished in a most unaccountable way. One settler out of a flock of five hundred could only muster one hundred while a second who had put one hundred ewes on his land, when he went to muster them could uot find a single sheep. Major Moore had thirty hoggets spirited away without a trace being left of them. It is possible that some of the missing sheep may have gone astray, while others may have died, but fclic ouly reasonable conclusion to be arrived at is that the others have been stolen. We would suggest that in order to clear the matter up the initial stej> be taken of a general muster, especially on lands on the sides of the rivers where fences are apt to be in bad repair and thus allow tko sheep to go astray. The next thing to do is for each owner to go round his flock at conveuienfc intervals of timo so that he may note any deficiency. In the event of the latter he should at onco report the circumstance to the police. By each farmer doing this the police would be able to locate and arrest the offending persons in a very short space of time. We believe that if each sheep-owner were to exercise this vigilance for himself the crime of sheep stealing would disappear altogether, because the chances of the detection of the offender would thus be reduced to a minimum. Sheepstealing is no new crime on this coast, and we have no fear in expressing the opinion that the diffidence of the sufferers in initiating persecutions, has been a direct encouragement to the commission of the crime.