62 THE SHEEP AND WOOL INDUSTRY 



with the combing wool. The small stained locks are also picked 

 out and kept by themselves. Very often an inexperienced wool- 

 sorter will pick out the small, dark, black, yolky locks for stained. 

 Only those locks that are stained by urine or dung should be 

 picked out, as all the black polky fribs will scour white. The 

 sorter must take out all the dags, no matter how small they 

 are, as if they are left in they become soft in the tank of the 

 scouring machine, and when they are going through the rollers 

 at the end of each tank they get squashed and stain all the wool 

 around them. When the wool is dry they look like black buttons 

 surrounded by stained locks, thus considerably lessening the value 

 of the scoured wool. 



The hairy stockings, or shanks, as they are called in most 

 sorting shops, have to be taken out also, and a separate sort 

 made of them. The shanks come off the bottom portion of the 

 sheep's legs, and consist of strips of short, hairy, and kempy 

 fibres. Merino shanks are kept separate from Cross-bred, as 

 the former are much the finer. The sorter has to remove all 

 foreign matter, such as broom whisks, matches, etc., which are 

 often found mixed through the locks. The sorts or qualities of 

 locks that are made in the scouring establishments in Australia 

 are practically the same as the combing wool qualities. Free 

 locks are kept separate from the burry,. and any discoloured locks, 

 such as charcoal stained or red sandy locks, are kept out of the 

 general lines, as they do not scour up perfectly white. Heavy 

 burry locks are made into lines by themselves ; in this sort 

 they generally blend two qualities together, confining them to 

 a Merino, a fine medium, and coarse Cross-bred quality. The 

 stained locks, which are picked out of the ordinary locks, are 

 also graded into their different lines. Stained locks scour up 

 a dark reddish or brown colour, according to the quantity 

 of urine stains they contain. Table locks are also kept apart 

 from the others. These consist of all the second cuts that fall 

 underneath the wool rolling tables at shearing time. Most 

 sorting establishments only keep table locks separate in the 

 Merino quality. 



