THE AGRICULTURIST

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12175, 26 November 1917, Page 3

THE AGRICULTURIST

RURAL TALKS.

(By RUSTICUS.) THE SHEARING. At the time of writing the weather for shfflrinf; is anything but. good. It is, however, beneficial to the country, and for that reason farmers will not mind putting up with a little inconvenience for the time being- The worst of it is that, at the present there is not sufficient rain to do much good to the hind, though it i.s freshening; up 'he grass and the crops. Under the foothills thorp are some nice showers, as thor 0 nearly always are when this sort of weather sets in. The rains over the remainder of the country are very light, sufficient to hinder the shearing without doing a good deal of good to anything. 1 hear that the crops in some parts arc getting a colouring of rust on them on .account of the damp weather, and I should nor bo at all surprised to Hnd that such is the case. I rind that tho heaviest of the crops are going down all over the place, and that some of them are so badly twisted that- they will nevor be good to work with, even if they should recover somewhat betore tho harvest takes place. Some of them will never get up again, and will not do much good in the patches which, have been flattened out. It is a fact that these crops, or those portions °l r them that become laid, never fill tho same as tin y would have done had they gone on all right. If. is to be hoped tha;. this damage will not extend very Jar over the crops, though it is evident, that there tvill be sonic thousands of acres affected if the damp conditions which at present prevail last for any length of time. It is a good thing, , however, that the rain is no heavier than it is, or the matter would bo much worse. Tho crops wanted some rain after the. parching nor"-westn\s that' we bad experienced, but heavy rain would have been disastrous.

It is in regard to the shearing, however, that 1 set out. to make a few remarks, till I was sidetracked by the consideration of tho crops, a, side of our farm activities that is very much in our minds at the present time, as so much depends upon how the weather behaves from this time on till harvest. The shearers will not like this broken weather in view of the long list, of sheds which the most of them have got to serve during the next few weeks. '1 he drizzling weather is worse for them than a good downpour that, gets it over and done with and is followed by a spell of fine weather- It is Qnly a week ago that we were speculating upon another dry summer and here wo are talking of the dripping conditions that prevail, hindering lor days on end the important work of shearing. But l it must be remembered that there is no weight of rain falling at ihe present time, and that if the weather were; to clear up, a lew hours of sunshine would soon dry up all tho signs of moisture that have appeared during the last fewdays.

When the weather is catchy there is a, tendency to start the shed again, even though the sheep may not be as dry as they should be. It is wonderful, what a. lot can be effected by wishing thii'- things exist o v are as good as one wotdd like to see them. In the same way thoughts can often lead us in the; opposite direction. For instance, if the, shearers have had & long run and ihoy are getting tired it is wonderful how wet ji small shower will make the wool, and how little effect a, (q\y hours - ' sunshine and wind will have in the process i of drying. But if the weatJier cont.imies to be broken, and the men are getting tired of waiting about, or perhaps there is .•mother shed about to .-tart in a few days' time, the slice]) will get dry enough to shear under the most uninviting or unpromising circumstances. It is no doubt very difficult indeed to tell with absolute certainly when the sheep are dry or wet, but the wish in cither direction has a lot to do with it. Machinery has been designed to deal with the problem, and if is stated that some inventors have got very nearly to perfection in this respect- fill there is some ineHianieal means of telling whether wool is wet or dry, there will always he disputes and differences of opinion aboil'' the matter- Jl is said that there is one machine that is doing the work very well, and if such is the ease, it is to be hoped that someone will lake the matter up. and get jt manufactured. I understand that there are some obstacles in the. way. but it will be a pity if the invention should lack support from the very people who should be most anxious to see it a success, namely, thp shearers and the employorf: Thorp are several nays in which both the men and ilm busses decide whether tho wool is wet or no! : some' oi them are fairly certain, others are not so sure. Ko]- instance, there i> the appearance of tile wool as it is opened out. on thp sheep, or as it lies 01/ the table, after it lias been flung up by 1 h-> fleecp pickers. Sometimes 1 lie drops of water can be discerned in the wool and on the skin ol the sheep. W hen that can lie done for certain, the wind is pretty wet. It is not always easy lo decide whether the drops are water or yolk. The laUey is, of course, «|ii i'*> harmless, but the former may irij'.ire the wool and. do Ihe shearer;-,' health harm. If the wool is wet it. feels cold and clammy, and it ihe. hand is stroked over the fleece where it has been cut by the shear 1 - the wool lies flat down, instead of i isinic up again as soon :;.-: the hand has been passed over llio fleece. The sorter can usually tell by the feel of the wool whether it is wet or dry, and so can the experienced shearer. The clot lies oi the latter become cold and clammy if tho sheep arc wet. a thing that does not happen if ihe wool is sinmly full of yolk- Xo doubt it is very hard for anyone to decide with ab-oluto certainty when wool is wet and when it is not, hut if one has been accustomed to handling wool for a number of years, and to shearing for a time, one can almost tell from intuition when wool is wet or dry. 'WOOL-CLASSING. There is a great deal of difference of opinion as to the merits and demerits of wool-classing. One frequently hears wool-growers—good men, too—state that there is little use in'' going to a lot of trouble in getting up the clip for sale. They assert that they get. just a.s good treatment at the hands of the havers as do those who class and grade their wool in the very best way. One would have thought that the present system of buying would havo altered that- opinion to r-ome extent, or at any I'nto (hat experience under the new system would have disabused their minds of the ideas that they had got hold of. But no, they are of the same opinion still indeed, more so, if anything, judging "by the conversations f have had with one or two of themThey say that they have done just as well as their neighbours, although they did not go to the same amount of trouble, and they are convinced that the reclassins: that is done by some of tho firms is of no benefit to the producer at all. My experience goes quite in the opposite direction, and I am sure that it pays, and pays well, in the; long ran to do-the wool up well. 1 'SO so far as - to- say-'that 'according '

©UR PRIMARY INDUSTRIES. THE MAN ON- THE LAND.

to my ideas the wool-classing job is the. most important in the. shed. Some say that the shearer's part of the contract is the most, important, hut it must ho conceded that a, badly shorn sheep will not lose much in vain p. for fattening purposes if it js all right in other respects. Of ooursp. T am aware that nie'ly shorn sheep always bring a little more in the yards than untidy animals, , hacked about as regards wool and skin, hut 1 contend that the difference is not so great as in the case of a well got up clip, and one that is thrown ' together anyhow. Of course, there is 1 the kind of shearing that chops the fleece about in such a. war as to spoil , it seriously, but such a shearer would not long he tolerated in a shod, whereas many an owner makes a honst that he does not take any particular care with his wool when getting it ready for market, and that he eom<\s out all right. A classer has fof to bo. up to his business properly in order to got. the, best, price, for his clip. He has goi. to decide on the number of classes that, tlie clip will make He might make too many or he might make too few. both of which will tell against the price of the wool. Tf the clip is classed in a competent, way, buyers will have confidence in the stuff, and will hid out on it in a way that they would not think of doing if they found that the grading or the get-up of the wool is unreliable. The flips should be. put into different grades according to length, quality, soundness and colour. If the buyer or the valuer finds that the, different grades arc mixed up, it stands to reason that he, cannot give as much for that, clip as he would do if lie, found every class true to name and type. When starting out to class a clip, it is just as well to make a few trial classes, as it wore, before committing oneself' to a definite line of action. I find thlit it is a good plan to put aside a few fleeces in the bins in the classes that suggest themselves when handling the first few fleeces. It will soon be found by comparison whether the first intentions in regard to the grading are going to hold good or whrthor an alteration will have to bo made. It is a strange thing, but it is true nevertheless, that there Avill he a. run of a certain class of woo] for a time, and on c will be led to think that a largj. portion of the clip is going to pan out- that way. After a time, perhaps in the next few sheep, the character of the wool seems to alter, and it will be found that otlvr plans will have to he made. I am, of course, speaking of a moderately sized clip only. If the shed is a big one and the sheep to he shorn run into thousands, it is. no doubt, quite possible that a classer will be able to get right into his stride at ! once, but T find that in a farmer's ! clip there is sure to be some alteration I from the original intentions. Tn other j words, a classer must not try to force, the wool into the classes he would like tn see it go into, He must class the I clip to, the best advantage as if is and as he finds it. The most successful classen is he who can adapt himself to the_ clip under his hand, instead of frying, to make the clip go the way he ! would like to see it. If there are only a few ; fleeces that will go into a, super class, there is no use trying to get the bulk of the clip into that class. On the other hand, if: is a mistake to pick out a few good fleeces in a clip that is really good, calling them super, or firsts, and nutting the rest of the clip into the seconds, when it might nearly all go in the superior class. 1 believe in skirting fairly heavily. I know that there arc many who hold the opposite opinion. They assert that they have proved deep skirting to be a losing game. Of course, there must be even skirting. There is no sense id dipping in deeply at one point and skipping altogether at another. The amount, that is taken off must be even all round if it is equally dirty or heavy all round. It is a good idea to pick over the pieces or the skirtings as they come off the fleece and to grade them into first and second pieces. If this is done, and it does not take, very long, the first pieces should bring just about as much as the fleece wool. I have often had that occur, and 1 suppose that others i have bad the same eNperionee. The. table locks and the sweepings from the floor or shearing hoard, the. fribs and trimmings, should never be put in among the second pieces, but should be kept by themselves and sold as such. I find that if a, buyer sees that a. certain amount of stuff has been taken out of the fleece woo! and put among the pieces, bellies and locks, he will give more for the. clip than he w;Il when he sees very little of that sort of stuff catalogued by the owner. That is one reason why some farmers who used to be i" the habit of shipping Home every year would never let. any of the cbp go bore. They wanted to send it all Home, together, so that the, buyers at, the other end might be abV to see for themselves what percentage of pieces and so on was taken out. of the clip. I have seen buyers come along and offer first-class prices for this stuff, the pieces, locks and .bellies, urging that, there was no use in shipping llonx* the dirt that is to be found in some, of these grades. The owner, however, refused in sell unless the whole of the flip went together, lie wanted the buyers at auction, wherever they might be, in see the clip as a whole, so that there might be no mistake n<; to what had been done with the clip in getting it up for the market. I hear that the, wool is coming off in first-class order , in many cases -white, clean and wellgrown. The' ivinter was a good one lor stock, and that should be the ease. At tin-* time of Avriting the weather | is of a. hindering kind, and there will be no for several days even if it. clears up. The rain is not heavy except in the lulls, and yet it is sufficient to thoroughly wet the wool.