WOOL STUDIES 311 



Sheep used. The sheep used in this experiment, like most of 

 those in eastern Ohio, were practically purebred Merinos, although 

 they were not recorded by any record association. They were com- 

 paratively free from wrinkles and should be classed in the C or light 

 B types, commonly referred to as the Delaine type of Merinos. 

 They had very dense fleeces which carried an unusually large 

 amount of yolk for sheep of this type. They were unusually strong 

 and rugged in constitution and were perhaps above the average with 

 regard to weight and quality of fleece. Each lot contained 19 

 wethers and 6 ewes. The ewes were not bred during the experiment. 



Management of the sheep. Until the last winter of the experi- 

 ment the sheep were managed with the object of keeping them in a 

 healthy, growing condition rather than of fattening them. During 

 the grazing season they were pastured on bluegrass without any 

 grain, and during the winter they were fed corn silage and clover or 

 alfalfa hay, with a light feed of corn. They were housed at night 

 and on bad days, and were allowed the run of a dry barnyard on 

 good days during the winter. During the latter part of the last 

 winter of the experiment they were fed a heavier grain ration to 

 have them ready for market at the close of the experiment, after 

 the last two lots of sheep were shorn in June, 1913. 



Washing and shearing. The sheep were washed in a stream of 

 sufficient swiftness to supply an abundance of clean water. Each 

 sheep was held in the stream separately and the dirt squeezed out 

 of the wool by hand. An attempt was made to do a thorough job 

 of washing, but, because of the density of the fleeces and the large 

 amount of yolk they carried, it is probable that the washed wool 

 still contained more foreign matter than is usually contained in 

 washed wool from more open-wooled sheep. After the sheep were 

 washed, from 7 to 10 days were allowed to intervene before they 

 were shorn, to allow the wool to dry out thoroughly. 



The shearing was done with power-driven clippers which in- 

 sured all the sheep being shorn with greater uniformity than is 

 possible when they are shorn with hand shears. 



Scouring 1 the wool. Because of the limited capacity of the 

 Station's wool-scouring equipment, only one-fourth of the fleeces 

 shorn in 1911 and 1913 were scoured in the wool laboratory at 

 Wooster. In selecting the fleeces to be scoured, an attempt was 

 made to select those that were representative of each lot. The 

 scouring was done by the emulsion process, similar to that used 



^Scouring is a trade term for the process of cleansing wool from impurities, such as yolk, 

 sand. dust. etc. Scoured ivool is wool from which such impurities have been removed. Grease 

 wool is wool as it comes from the sheep, whether or not it was washed before shearing. 



