THE RURAL WORLD.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 545, 26 February 1913, Page 6

THE RURAL WORLD.

THE MATING SEASON

A PEW REMARKS ON BREEDING.

At this time uf year, sheep farmers era considering the mating of their sheep; some for their general flocks, others for breeding lambs to fatten, and for stud purposes. The stud breeder is the man who has the greatest difficulty, many days of anxious thought are often given to tbs decision of which sheep to use on certain ewes. He goes to sahs and examines the rams offered for sale, be sees one which perhaps does not quite corae up to his ideal requirements, but he finds be is by a certain ram, ;: pr of blood which he hsa a fancy for; discretion is thrown to the winds and he makes his purchase, sometimes to be grievously disappointed when he gets the sheep home and makes another critical examination, or it ma° be, to like him better, than lie thought. The purchase of any ram is a great lottery, for in the case of sheep not only is it imperative that you have carcase, constitution, and breeding, but that you have covering as well. We would put constitution above everything and wool second, although it ia this commodity which brings the money into the pocket. Wherever a flock master has failed to keep up the constitution of his flock it has gone down rapidly in the estimation of the public, who are shrewd judges of the standard of any flock. There as*e, of course, breeds in which wool ia a secondary consideration, for instance the Shropshire and the Southdown; these are of the short woolled breed, but 6ven in thesa breeds the wool ia a consideration, for if it is not close, there always seems less tendency in the progeny to fatten. We have heard a close thinker and observer say "Gi'e me the carcase and constitution, and I'll soon put the wool on't." There are three ways of breeding viz.: inbreeding; line breeding; and out-crosaing. The latter is divided into a climatic out-cross and a complete cut cross. Some breeders stick to one system entirely, while others mix them. The system most difficult to continue with success is in-breed-ing. There are advantages to be gained by the use of this system which are not possible in any other way. If fixity of type is wanted, there is no system so certain of reeult. Here, however, a large "but" comes in, and. it is, that in nearly every case the constitution suffers. It requires more skill to continue inbreeding; more genius, we might say, and yet be successful than with any other system. Lord; Polworth started his celebrated flock of Border Leicesters with five ewes, and he rang the changes on these five lines of blood for nearly the whole tima his flock was in existence under Patterson, his noted shepherd—the system succeeded in a wonderful way. The points certainly were more bare and there was less belly wool, but the carcase was admirable.

Whether it was that th 9 system had been carried on to the breaking point, o? whether it was that Patterson's guiding mind was gone, the flock deteriorated as soon as Patterson left, and when by force of circumstances the flock was dispersed, the prices were very disappointing, and it was the oldest ewes that fetched most money, showing that the public thought the flock was on the rapid down grade. In Shorthorns again, when the Sittzton herd was dispersed, the prices showed that the public thought the highest point of excel lence had not neen reached. Yet Amos Cruickshank was noted as a believer in in-breeding. There were, however, shrewd judges who said that had the system been carried any farther the herd would have deteriu rated. Then, again, some breeds of sheep are so constituted that inbreeding does not seem to affect.them aa in other breeds. The Merino is an instance of this. The Famden flock of merinos is nearly 100 years old, yet there is a small flock extant which has never had an out-cross. Like the Chillingham cattle, they are kept as a matter of sentiment for no one would nowadays use any of the breed for stud purposes.

Ail the horn breeds seem to be hardly constitutioned sheep. The Scotch Blackfaced, the Louk, the Dorset-horn for instance, but in this case in-breed-ing is not resorted to. In the Merinos, however, many breeders say they do not go outside their own flocks for> sires, though this is not the case in Tasmania, where breeders reciprocate to a very great extent in the use of their best sheep. Under these conditions of more or less in-breeding, Australia has bred up during the century which has elapsed since sheep became common, probably the finest and certainly the most valuable breed of sheep in the world. They used an out-cross —the Vermont sheep—but these are again being discarded as having too many wrinkles and the tendency to kemp. Line breeding is more common perhaps in the long-woolled sheep, for these breeds do not seem to have the constitution of the Merino, probably because they are made up breeds, while the Merino is quite purebred. The breed which stands in breeding worse than any is the Lincoln, but iudicious line breednig has been quite successful. Most stud breeders more or less use this system.

When a man gets to the top of the tree in sheep breeding, the difficulty he has, ia to get sheep to suit his flock, and generally it results in rival breeders exchanging rams probably with their own blood running through those they get in exchange. The late Henry Dudding, a great breeder, one of the geniuses of his day, always bought his sires from flocks where his own rams had been used, so there was only a half outcross reared on different country io his own, that is the mother of the ram was the only part of the line of breeding not his own. The late Thomas Kirkham Biscuthorpe, the greatest Lincoln breeder of his day, so his son told the: present writer,

aiways bought his sires by rams of his own breeding, but bred in another flock. The cross breeding was thus not violent. Breeders as a rale, do not discuss these matters very freely, nor have we any knowledge of how Bakewell improved the breed of Leicesters, which he transformed in his own lifetime from a coarse common sheep to a very fine useful sheep with great propensity to fatten. He, however, must have gone largely on the in-breeding principle for they had no contemporary breeder of like note to himself. Unfortunately, there is no record of the system he used, but it could not have been other than selection amongst his own flock. iThe third system of breeding, viz., the out-cross is one moat generally in vogue amongst breeders of long wools. In most cases, however, in a modified form.

The system is to go to another flock for sires. Some import from the Kentish breeders every now and again sheep from flocks which come nearsßt their own ideals. The progeny of these rams up to tha third generation from home ewes are generally used as sires, occasionally longer then recourse is again had to England for fresh blood. <