A HEW PROCESS OF WOOLWASHING.

Press, Volume XIV, Issue 1824, 16 February 1869, Page 3

A HEW PROCESS OF WOOLWASHING.

[From the " Nelson Colonist," Fob. 3.] We have before us a sample of wool, washed on the sheep's back, from the run of Dr Ken wick. It is pure, and white as the driven snow ; soft and flexible, and the " staple " draws out in silvery threads, which show that it is fit to go at once into the spinning mill, and undergo the first operation without further preparation. The process by which this is effected it is not necessary to describe, except to mention the fact that by a system of tanks, baths, and other mechanical arrangements, a large number of sheep can be thoroughly cleansed in the fleece in an hour's time, with hot water mixed with soap and soda. The details 01 the method the practical sheep-farmer already knows, and is putting in practice. What we are desirous of showing is the profit which j arises out of this changed system of wool-growing. Firstly, this cleansing process, while benefitting the fleece, cannot fail also to do good to the sheep, by keeping down disease, which, in the home country where sheep are reared, has been greatly reduced by reason of cleanliness alone. In the next place, the wool being thoroughly cleansed before it is shorn from the sheep's back, is preserved in the fleece compact and whole, and is not disturbed in its fibres in the manner which is inevitable when the fleece in grease has to be scoured after shearing. This of itself adds considerably to the value of wool washed on the sheep, as compared with that of wool washed in the fleece. In the matter of a comparison between wool sent home "in grease," and that sent cleansed by the new system, a few figures will best explain the advantages flowing to the sheepfarmer from the latter system. Looking on the apparatus as a necessary plant, which costs a few hundred pounds at the outset, and is regarded simply as capital, we find that the cost of washing is not more than a penny per sheep. An ordinary fleece weighs about four and a half pounds in the grease. Washed in this manner it weighs three pounds, thus losing, say one-third —the actual loss is said to be 30 per cent.; but we take it at one-third, which is rather more, and is an error on the safe side in calculations of this kind. There is thus, out of every four and a-half of wool formerly sent home in grease, a saving of freight on one and a-half pounds. Wool in grease is worth about 8d per pound. Washed by the hew process it is worth Is 6d to 2s; and an : advance of Is 6d per pound, with the expectation of larger returns, has been rhade on wool so produced. From these figures a very instructive sum, or rather, by way of contrast, two sums—in arithmetic can be performed thus: — Wool in Grease. £ s. d. 100 sheep=4so lbs wool at 8d per lb 15 0 0 Deduct—Freight to London, at o|d per lb ... ... ... 112 10 Vi.i'i ■■• ';' '. £13 7 2 Wool washed on back. l r o Bheep=3oo lbs wool at (average) Is 9d per lb ... ... 26 5 0 Deduct—Cost of washing, at Id per head, 8s 4d • freight, £1 Is lid ... ... ... 110 3 £24 14 9 This yield is nearly cent per cent additional. It is an increase of over 2s 3d per fleece, besides the advantage to the health of the animal. These are instructive figures, and we commend them to the careful and we hope profitable consideration of all who are directly interested in sheep and wool, and who have not yet adopted the process now at work on Dr Renwick's run, with the advice, " Go ye and do likewise."