WET OR DRY!

Clutha Leader, Volume XX, Issue 1025, 16 March 1894, Page 3

WET OR DRY!

It seems a most difficult thing to tell by the sense of touch whether wool is wet or dry ; in fact shearers of lonsc experience confess it is impossible to do so. The question came up at the late Intercolonial Shearers' Conference held -in Sydney: It was announced that, in response to a reward of LSO offered by the last intercolonial conf * •- ence held in Melbourne for the invention of a machine to test wet sheep, a number of application's had been received from all the colonies. The Amalgamated Workers' Union of Queensland had offered a supplementary reward of L 25, and it was the duty of the conference to award the prize. The object of the union in making the offer was to obtain some satisfactory method of discovering whether a sheep was wet or not. One of the inventions, by a member of the union, was tested by the delegates — who are, all practical men — at the conference on the 12th ult.. and it gave the greatest satisfaction. It not only registered the fact of a sheep being wet, but indicated the amount of moisture contained in the fleece. It was eventually resolved to request the Pastoralists' Union to appoint a representative from each of the colonies to meet representa tives of the shearers' unions of the various colonies, and to request the Government to appoint a scientific man to sit upon this board. The duties of the board will be to test each of the machines, and to determine, from a practical and scientific point of view, which invention should be awarded the prizes of L 75.