The causes of this constant diminution are numerous. First of all we will take the development of agriculture, which has expelled the sheep. According to an eminent collaborator in the census, “The sheep has to walk, must walk far and wide, must walk always, in order to eat sufficiently—unless he does so, his food will be too costly; he is essentially a vagabond, and he consequently requires a great space and continual supervision.”[56] For these reasons the European small farmer prefers, if he can, to keep one or two cows in his cow-shed and suppress the sheep entirely.
[56] Probably the sheep would pay better if kept more as cattle are kept. The theory of long marches only applies to enormous flocks, so thick upon the ground that they must walk miles a day, eating all the time. If the whole herd of sheep on a large sheep-farm were divided into many small flocks, and the farm into, say, ten times as many pastures, each flock might be turned for two days into each pasture, so that it would have three weeks’ growth on it before the flock returned: or, if large enough to feed the sheep twenty days, it would have twenty weeks in which to recover—time to grow a crop of leguminous fodder, after which a splendid crop, or series of crops, of cereals could be grown upon it. Under such a system the sheep would wander less, fatten quickly and be more tender. English sheep-farming is on an infinitesimal scale, but the profits from a small flock changed from pasture to pasture are often very considerable.—[Trans.]
Sheep-breeding really gives encouraging results in regions where the area of the soil and the prairies is out of all proportion to the number of labourers available for its culture. Land given up to sheep cannot support the high rents paid by the producers of cereals; this is the principal cause of the decline of sheep-farming all the world over.[57]
[57] Other causes are: the invention of mixtures of cotton and wool; the use of silk and mercerised cotton; and the production of cellular or netted cotton and linen underclothing, which is healthier and cheaper than wool, and equally warm; also the improvement of wool-bearing breeds, through which fewer sheep will produce the same quantity of wool. The export of cheap beef from America is another active factor.—[Trans.]
The following table gives the total number of beasts of various kinds, classed according to purity of breed:—
| Species. | Pure. | Cross-bred. | Native. | Total. |
| Cattle | 984,897 | 13,060,446 | 13,071,282 | 29,116,625 |
| Horses | 49,000 | 1,693,037 | 5,788,739 | 7,331,376 |
| Mules | — | — | 465,037 | 465,037 |
| Asses | — | — | 285,088 | 285,088 |
| Sheep | 1,179,482 | 55,448,749 | 10,583,523 | 67,311,754 |
| Goats | 3,321 | 129,800 | 3,816,965 | 3,945,086 |
| Swine | 34,462 | 589,126 | 780,003 | 1,403,591 |
In the matter of cross-breeding the Argentine has made astonishing progress, the proof of which is to be found in the comparison of the figures for 1895 with those of 1908. It is enough, for our purpose, to mention that in 1895, in the Province of Buenos Ayres, out of 100 cattle, 6 per cent. were of pure blood: 49·2 per cent. were cross-bred, and 50·2 per cent. were of native breeds; and that thirteen years later these figures were transformed into 6·2 per cent. of pure blood, 85·1 per cent. of cross-bred cattle, and 8·7 per cent. of native breeds. This improvement in the Province of Buenos Ayres is repeated in the other more productive Provinces, and in the case of other species of animals.
We have stated that the number of cattle in the Argentine Republic is over 29 millions; this number may be analysed, according to sex, age, etc., in the following manner:—
Year 1908.