AUCKLAND WOOL SALE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 430, 13 January 1912, Page 3

AUCKLAND WOOL SALE.

SATISFACTORY PRICES. The second series of the eeason's wool sales took place on Wednesday at the Chamber of Commerce buildings. Owing to unfavourable weather conditions tli9 offerings totalled only 6672 bales,b eing a decrease of 1300 bales as compared with the January sales of last year. Shearing has thus far been tardy, and it is therefore reasonable to expect heavier listings for the final sales next month. A full bench of buyers was in evidence, comprising five from England two from America, three from the Continent, and light local speculators and fellniongers. Bidding was keen, and the feature of the sales was not only the maintenance of the satisfactory prices that characterised the opening sales, but an all-round advance of from Jd to Id per lb. Then inferior crossbreds realised from to 7£d, medium from 7:fd to B£d, fine crossbreds in light condition B|d to 9|d, and specially picked lines of halfbreds up to lljd. Wednesday's offerings were practically all crosbsrmls, mostly medium, but some fine wools, together with the usual percentage of bellies and pieces. There was also a proportion of lambs' wool. The Bradford men were buying freely, and the Continental representatives were frequently topping the bids, while the Americans rapped out their calls in lively fashion whenever fine wools in clean, light condition, and well skirted were submitted. Lambs' wool was also eagerly snapped up. On the question of skirting some of the visiting buyers were very caustic in their references to the unsatisfactory condition of much of the Auckland wool. "If your growers won't get rid of the grease and dirt," said one to a representative of the Star, they can't expect to reach the prices paid in othar parts, where skirting is religiously carried out. Some of the wool we have had to examine here this time is right over the odds, and in certain instances we have met with false packing—a nice fleece on top and a very nasty one beneath. Those sort of people are soon picked, and apart from the question of principle it doesn't pay them. The big wool houses, you know, don't send out lemons to be squeezed, and the sooner these practices are checked the better we will get on together."