The Angora or "Mohair" Goat. -73 



then lopping over, more resembling the ears of a mastiff 

 on the alert, and best described perhaps as semi-pendent. 

 The horns are flat-shaped ; they should be set far apart 

 on the head, and taper gradually towards the tips. Their 

 direction depends on the sex. In the male they should 

 incline first to the rear, with a slight twist outward, and 

 the ends pointing upwards. In the female, on the 

 contrary, they take a lateral direction, the spiral being 

 more decided, and the extremities pointing downward. 

 The chief feature, however, necessarily consists in the 

 length, texture, and character of the fleece, which should 

 be as free from anything like hair as possible. In the 

 best specimens it is of a fine silky nature, growing in 

 thickly-matted flakes near the skin, and then separating 

 into long corkscrew-shaped ringlets, covering the whole 

 animal as far as the hocks. 



It is this material which is known commercially as 

 mohair, and which is shorn off every spring for manu- 

 facture into fabrics. If not removed in this way it falls 

 off naturally as the summer approaches. Besides this 

 fleecy covering, however, there is an undergrowth of ordi- 

 nary hair which is very short and lies close to the skin, 

 being no doubt intended by Nature as an additional 

 protection against cold when the animal sheds its outer 

 coat. In common kinds the average weight of fleece in a 

 herd, reckoning full-grown goats and kids, is about 2 Jib., 

 but in the best breeds it attains an average of 61b. The 

 greatest weight is taken from the rams, which shear as 

 much as lolb. and i2lb. each, those that are castrated, 

 and between two and four years old, producing the finest 

 quality. The length of the strands is about Sin. 



Suitable Climatic Conditions. 



The Angora stands cold well, providing the climate 

 is a perfectly dry one. In a communication made to 



