24 BULLETIN 573, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



months is interfered with. If shearing is delayed later than May, 

 the sheep may shed a part of the wool and the fleece become ragged. 

 When shearing, a clean floor should be provided. The wool should 

 be clipped off close to the body, and as smoothly as possible, all the 

 fleece being kept in one piece. The tag wool should then be removed 

 and the fleece neatly rolled with the flesh side out and tied with paper 

 twine. It is advantageous to sack the wool of the rams and black 

 sheep separately. The tag wool should be sacked separately and 

 labeled. 1 In some of the long-wool flocks, where lambs have come 

 early and the shearing is done late, the lambs are sheared. This 

 undoubtedly is advantageous to the lambs, as they are thriftier, 

 more active, and attain greater size. The practice, however, has a 

 disadvantage at the time the lambs are sold, as, because of the ap- 

 pearance of the wool, the buyer is likely to mistake the lambs for 

 yearlings and quote prices accordingly. After the shearing is com- 

 pleted, the sheep should be dipped if lice or ticks are present in the 

 flock. 



MARKETING. 



Marketing lambs. The first early lambs that have received good 

 care are marketed late in May or in June. Practically all are shipped 

 to the large markets of the Middle West, chiefly Omaha. The freight 

 rate from the Minidoka project to Omaha is 68 cents per hundred- 

 weight on a minimum of 23,000 pounds to the double-deck car. 



Marketing methods have not yet become well established. There 

 is some informal cooperative shipping in a few districts where car- 

 load lots occasionally are sent to market by groups of neighboring 

 farmers. This is a practice that could well be increased, as marketing 

 from the small bands is sometimes difficult. If sold before other ship- 

 ments from farms or from the ranges arrive, small numbers of lambs 

 must be held by the buyer until a full carload has been secured. This 

 is an expensive system and results in a wide variation in price, even 

 for lambs of the same market type. Shipments of farm lambs usually 

 are made in connection with shipments from the ranges. Table III 

 shows the number of cars of sheep and lambs shipped from the project 

 each month from May 1 to December 31, 1916. Included in these 

 shipments, approximately 5,500 head of lambs were marketed from 

 the farms. 



Marketing wool. As there is no wool exchange or other public mar- 

 ket on the project, each individual owner ordinarily attends to the 

 marketing of his own wool. By shearing time most of the range 

 sheep have been taken to the ranges. The clip from a large number of 



1 Useful detailed information regarding shearing, classing, and marketing wool has been given by Mar- 

 shall and Heller. (Marshall, F. R., and Heller, L. L. The woolgrower and the wool trade. U. S. Dept. 

 Agr. Bui. 206, 32 pp., 1 fig., 11 pis. 1915.) 



