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Show Results Of BAC Range Experiment Told At Meeting, More than a hundred livestock producers of southern Utah, County Coun-ty Agents, 4-H and Future Farmer Farm-er leaders, and other livestock in-dustry in-dustry leaders met at the Branch Agricultural college Friday, for the second annual livestock field day at which findings on Utah's ranch sheep management experiments being be-ing conducted at the Branch college col-lege were reported. Dr. T. Donald Bell, chairman of the division of agriculture at the ' BAC and professor of animal husbandry, hus-bandry, summarized the results of the experiment obtained in the past 3 years during an afternoon session, ses-sion, and in the evening J. E. Norby, Nor-by, Dubois, Idaho, director of regional re-gional sheep breeding laboratory of the United States department of agriculture, addressed the group. Mr. Norby, explained the work at the Idaho station and emphasized the importance of scientific meth ods of determining actual shrinkage shrink-age of wool clips. He malntalne the substitution of core boring of wool to determine shrinkage rather rath-er than depending on guessing methods now used In marketing wool, can save growers millions of dollars. Mr. Norby pointed out that where guessing methodg have been used, most Utah wools have been shrunk as much as -66 percent, but under the core boring and sampling technique tech-nique recently developed at the Idaho station, the shrinkage has been cut to 56 percent. "A wrong guess of as much as one percent could mean a thousand dollar loss to the average operator in Utah," he said. The Idaho leader expressed keen Interest in the program being conducted con-ducted at the BAC and complimented compliment-ed Dr. Bell and his assistants on the efficiency with which the program pro-gram is being handled. Dr. Bell's report at the field day meeting Included complete shipping ship-ping and slaughter data on grass fat Iambs taken from the college ranch la Cedar Canyon and sold at Los Angeles. Using four different crosses of lambs, two Columbia crosses and two Ramboulllet crosses, the college col-lege staff this year followed the lambs through to the packing (Continued on Back Page) Results Of B. A. C. Range Experiments Told At Meeting (Continued from Front Face) house and graded the individual carcasses after slaughter, thus giving giv-ing accurate data on comparative meat qualities of the various lambs. Lowest shrinkage this year was found to be in the second cross Columbia lambs which registered a shrinkage of less than 2 percent in transit. Findings on the Important question ques-tion of trucking or trailing to mar ket were discussed by Dr. Bell, and he pointed out that unless the lambs are sold within two days, there is no apparent weight advantage ad-vantage in trucking the lambs, especially es-pecially if the distance is compara tively short. Beginning the experiment in 1944 the college purchased 900 yearling ewes, end each year the ewes have been divided into groups. Dr. Bell stated, and bred to either Rambouil- let or Columbia rams until last fall when a new breed, the Targee, was introduced. Indicated results point to unusual success with the Targee crosses under normal Utah range conditions, he said. Both the Columbia and the Targee breeds were developed at the Dubois breed ing laboratories. Sponsored by the Utah State Agricultural Ag-ricultural college experiment station, sta-tion, research at the branch college covers forestry, range management including artificial rcseeding mui other phases of livestock production, produc-tion, and is being watched with interest in-terest bf livestock leaders of the county, said Dr. Louis L. Mariscn head of the Utah State Agricultural college, and one of the participants in Friday's field day. Dr. R. H. Walker, dean of the school of agricultural, U S A C, and director of the experiment station in Utah, spoke briefly during the afternoon on objectives of the experiment ex-periment and praised the local staff for Us efficient management Members of the local staff lit charge of the experiment include Dr. Bell; Dr. Madsen; Wallace Hanson, chairman, division of for estry, BAC; D. Clarence Sehmutz, agricultural economist; Don Mathews, Math-ews, sheep herd manager; Olen Walqulst, agronomist; Eugene Hal-terman, Hal-terman, valley farm manager, and Eldro Rlgby, manager of the campus cam-pus farm at the college. C. W. Orlffln, general manager of Swift & Co., Los Angeles, who cooperated in the slaughter and shipping statistics, was a special guest at the conference with Dr J. S. Prestwlch, Cedar City; E. H. Street, Richfield, trustees of the college; Dr. H. Wayne Drlggs, director; di-rector; R. L. Wrlgley, of Utah State extension service; Sclar Hutch lngs, director, Desert range experiment experi-ment station, and Earl E. House, district grazier for the federal land management bureau. |