Sheep, breeds and management (1893) (14595288248)

Identifier: sheepbreedsmanag00wrig (find matches)
Title: Sheep, breeds and management
Year: 1893 (1890s)
Authors: Wrightson, John
Subjects: Sheep
Publisher: London, Vinton
Contributing Library: UMass Amherst Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries



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ed. The Shropshire Sheep Society has been longer in existencethan any other, and no pedigrees of sheep are more carefullyrecorded. It is the first breed we have met with in which thesires are distinguished by a Flock-book number. We havelittle doubt that a good deal of the success which Shropshiresheep breeders have met with in the foreign and colonialtrades is due to the careful manner in which the pedigrees areworked out. We are passing through an important epoch in sheepbreeding. Never was there a greater interest shown in thisbranch of pastoral life, as indicated by the formation ofsociety after society for the promotion of various breeds.The Shropshire breeders were followed by the Suffolk Downand the Oxfordshire Down men, and the breeders of Wen-sleydale Longwools, and still more recently we have seen theHampshire flockmasters combine in an association foundedupon similar lines. Even the long-established and aristocraticSouthdown, despite its blue blood and indisputable lineage,
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iP»ii;;iiP^^ m mm THE SUFFOLK DOWN. 75 has yielded to the spirit of the times, and a society and aclub have been formed. There are also societies for Lincolns,Cheviots, Cotswolds, Dorset Horns, and Improved Leicesters. The Suffolk Down. This excellent breed is one of the few survivors of the oldcounty breeds of Down sheep which inhabited the ChalkHills of Southern England, and extended from Norfolk andSuffolk through Essex, Kent, Sussex, Surrey, Hants, Bucks,Berks, Wilts, Dorset and other counties possessing chalkdowns. Of these Down breeds we can only name threewhich are of importance, namely, the Southdown, HampshireDown and Suffolk Down, and these last have been greatlyimproved by the Southdown. The original Suffolk sheepexisted in famous flocks during Arthur Youngs time inpeculiar form in the neighbourhood of Bury St. Edmunds.Mr. Edward Prentice, the able Secretary of the Suffolk SheepSociety, has contributed an excellent account of the genesis of the breed, and a scale of points