FINE WOOLLED SHEEP

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23302, 12 April 1941, Page 6

FINE WOOLLED SHEEP

(To the Agricultural Editor.! Sir _ln answer to your correspondent “Peninsula,” on the subject of fine woolled sheep, he apparently thinks that I view the subject from the wool point only, and that I am not well versed in sheep farming nor in the most suitable breeds for producing fat lambs and sheep for the frozen meat trade. To remove such an idea, I may state that I was brought up on 5 large South Canterbury sheep station (Ramcliff), which property sent away yearly at least 5000 fat sheep and the same number of fat lambs, and these were bred directly from halfbreds. I may state' that the yield of wool a wether was nearer 121b than the low average of 61b stated by “Peninsula.” To the many farmers that favour the Romney ewe and Southdown ram for producing fat lambs, the percentage of lambs is the main factor, and secondly the weight. These breeders do not place much value on wool, which is a secondary consideration. In the same issue as your correspondent’s letter is an article in the Finance and Commerce column on the world’s wool supply, which states that the British Government has far more merino wool under its control than crossbred. The total production of Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom is about 70 per cent, merino, and 30 per cent, crossbred. This exactly bears out my contention that it is fine wool that the world wants. —Yours, etc., W. O t MACKAY. Christchurch, April 5.