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Show AMERICAN WOOL NEEDS 3STTER HANDLING. A preliminary report of the investigation into the methods of marketing American wool, now being conducted by the departments de-partments of Agriculture, indicates indi-cates that from 10 to 20 per cent of the value of the crop is lost annually through the neglect neg-lect of a few simple measures. Under existing conditions, when American and Australian Austral-ian wools lie side by side in the warehouse, the poor handling of American wools is so noticeable notice-able that the price is inevitably affected. This handicap would be removed to a great extent if all the wool growers would ag--ee to do four things: j Sack ewe, lamb and buck i I'.eecs in seperate sacks, j Shear blac k sheep seperately and keep the fleeces seperate. Tie the lleeces with paper twine, which does not adhere ! to the wool. Remove the tags, etc., and put them in seperate sacks marked to show their, contents. Figaros prepared by the Bu- ren of Statistics (Agricultural Forecasts) and based on re- m ports from :js:j growers who Jj sheared in 1913 a total of 2,209, 003 sheep show that at the present time about one-half of the flock owners sack owe, lamb, and buck wool seperate- ly, about sixty per cent seper- ; ate the black wool and tie with I paper twine, and less than one- i half put tags in seperate sucks, i It is pointed out, however, that t the correspondents who took the trouble to answer the in- l quiries of the investigators, L and from whose replies these statistics are compiled, pre- ; sumably represent the more progressive element in the industry, in-dustry, and that if it were possible pos-sible to obtain the facts from every woolgrower in the country coun-try the percentage of those using us-ing the improved methods would be found to be much j lower. I It is pointed out also that al- j though on the face of them, these .returns do not seem so unsatisfactory, the value of wools produced in a given locality lo-cality is set by the general reputation rep-utation already established. Buyers will not alter their prices for small individual clips, though they may be better bet-ter handled than the average, and in consequence those who do put up their wool properly are made to suffer for the sins of their neighbors. Buying concerns can and may, however, allow their representatives rep-resentatives more latitude in discriminating between indi vidual clips. But even should, they do so, prices could be altered al-tered only for clips of sufficient size to yield around 10,000 pounds of each grade contained. contain-ed. Fifty nine cases were reported report-ed in which dockage was made upon the whole clip, although the tags had been seperately sacked. The remedy, the investigators investiga-tors declare, is to raise the reputation rep-utation of a locality by an agreement among the growers not to permit any poorly handled hand-led wool to leave the community. commun-ity. It can not be said that the growers who follow the practices prac-tices advocated by the market at present receive much, if any, compensation for so doing. As in other lines, it rests with such progressive individuals to bring their communities up to a common standard that will be of benefit to all. In the opinion of the investi- gators the reforms already mentioned would be sufficient for the present to put American Ameri-can wool in a different light. Later it may be advisable to adopt the Australian methods of "skirting," or removing from the fleece the wool of the legs and belly, and grading before be-fore sacking, but this is not urged now. |