An account of the improvements on the estates of the Marquess of Stafford, in the counties of Stafford and Salop, and on the estate of Sutherland : with remarks. Pt.1, Sutherland / by James Loch.
- James Loch
- Date:
- 1820
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: An account of the improvements on the estates of the Marquess of Stafford, in the counties of Stafford and Salop, and on the estate of Sutherland : with remarks. Pt.1, Sutherland / by James Loch. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![[63] provement in Sutherland, and that will convert, not only the fine grass, but the Alpine plants into wool and mutton. In explaining to you the mode of managing the fiocks in Sutherland, I shall refer to my own practice, not that there is any thing in it better than that of my neighbours, probably very much to the contrary ; but, that I can more easily explain, through it, our manner of availing ourselves of the various plants that grow on our farms. These plants have each its peculiar time of coming into season. A critical time intervenes between the fading of one plant and the coming of that next in season, and the two most critical times for stock are, first, betwixt the latter end of March to the 1st of May, that is, be- twixt the fading of the cotton grass, and the springing of the deer hair; and secondly, betwixt the 1st of August and 1st of September, or the fading of the deer hair, and the coming of the harvest moss. If pains be not taken at all seasons, but particularly at these two seasons, in- jury may very readily be done to the stock. My flocks consist of four ewe hirsels, two gimmer hii’sels, for testing up these ewe flocks; two hog hirsels, and two wether hirsels. Besides these, one of my hog hirsels, Culmaily, takes in my sale wethers, to prepare them for market, and keeps my tups ; and Morvich takes in my sale ewes, to the same end, and ^keeps my fine ewes; that is, the choicest ewes of all my flocks, kept apart for breeding my tups or male sheep from. Our lambs are speaned about the middle of July, and carried off directly to a piece of deer hair ground, and tended about ten days, until the bleat or crying for their mothers leaves them. They then get very dull and settled, and are, presently, collected and shed, or di-](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24880395_0259.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
