234 Western Live-stock Management 



This is work that is always performed at the mill, while 

 grading, skirting, and classing are done at the shed. 



The old method of sacking wool in a long burlap bag just 

 as it is shorn could be best described as a lack of system. 

 The wool is tramped into the sack while it is still warm. 

 No care is taken to separate the fleeces into classes or 

 grades, or to keep the dirt out. When wool is marketed 

 in this manner, the buyer usually has the advantage of 

 the grower, since the grower does not know what his wool 

 is worth. Buyers purchasing all grades of wool mixed 

 in one sack buy on the basis of the poorer grades. Until 

 the last five or ten years, this method of packing wool 

 was the only one in use in the United States. In the 

 hands of untruthful growers this system is even worse 

 than described above. Such cases as these are reported 

 by the Textile World Record. From one fleece 121 feet 

 of stout rough twine were taken. Twenty-two lamb tails 

 were found rolled in another fleece. A boulder weighing 

 seven pounds was received in a fleece by a Boston firm. 

 Such practices, while not general, are very demoralizing 

 to the wool industry. They are usually prompted by 

 dissatisfaction on the part of the grower. 



Within recent years the various wool-warehouses about 

 the country have been making various propositions to 

 the wool-grower. Most of them are something as follows. 

 The warehouse handles the wool on a commission basis, 

 grading, baling, storing, and selling it for the grower. In 

 some cases the warehouse sends a grader and baler to the 

 shearing sheds and the work of grading and baling is done 

 at the time of shearing. In other cases the warehouse 

 receives the wool in the long bag from the grower and does 

 the work of grading and baling at the central warehouse. 

 This method of packing wool is more expensive, but the 



