Re-export Of Crooks

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31866, 19 December 1968, Page 18

Re-export Of Crooks

Shepherd’s crooks, made in England, are being re - exported through Christchurch to Australia and the United States. It is not big business, however. Most of the sales for re-export are made to visiting farmers, or to friends of farmers overseas. A Christchurch woman, whose son-in-law, a Lincoln College graduate, now farms near Launceston, Tasmania, recently sent him two of the crooks as a present. “He took two of the crooks back to Tasmania a year ago, but they have both broken,” she said. “He couldn’t get

them in Tasmania, and the stock and station agency in Christchurch from which I bought them said that several sales a year were made to Australians.” The crooks, in two types, for restraining sheep either by the leg or the neck, are

made of ash by Coopers, an English firm that has been in the business for generations. They are 4ft 9in long, and, because of their lightness, are preferred by some farmers to metal crooks, made in New Zealand. The crooks cost $1.60 each and to send them air-freight to Tasmania cost another $2.35.

“We get quite a number of inquiries from United States servicemen,” said a stock and station agency salesman. “Unfortunately, the crooks are just an inch or two too long to send through the mail.” Several firms import the crooks, which are not subject to control. They form a sideline for a city tobacconist, who has built up a steady farm demand.

“A gross a year would knock us back,” said a salesman in one of the importing firms. “We generally land them in May or June, in time for lambing.”