Deterioration in Wool

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 412, 21 July 1928, Page 25

Deterioration in Wool

POSITION IN NEW ZEALAND

No Need for Alarm

DURING the past decade complaints have been received from Bradford regarding the quality of New Zealand wools. Allegations have been made to the effect that the type of crossbred wool produced in New Zealand was developing certain features distinctly objectionable to spinners. The report on the question recently released by the Wool Research Board shows that there is little need for alarm. The department responsible, however, is having the position investigated.

The complaints principally concerned the Romney cross breeds, and the main source o£ contention was the tact that the wool of this breed tended to contain an undue proportion of hairy, harsh fibres, and also that there was a great variation in fleeces which consisted of really pure wool to those which could be more or less classed as hair. This has been proved to be the ease as a result of investigations carried out by officers of the Department of Agriculture. The initial experiments showed that the detrimental hair-like structure in what might be termed rough wool was not only a regular feature in Romney and Romney cross wool, but was also common in all long-wool breeds, This fact is of the utmost importance, as it indicates that the remedy lies along the lines of selection and management rather than on the lines of an alteration of the actual breed. Offhand, therefore, the problem for the improvement of our standard 42 to 48 quality wool (the majority of New Zealand clip lies within these qualities) appears quite simple. Further research by the departmental officers, however, showed that the simple remedy of using only rams whose fleece characteristics were wool ones rather than hair ones cannot be put into operation as easily as one could wish, as there is a certain element of doubt as to whether the pure wool type of Romney and Romney cross is the really suitable type that should be striven after by all woolgrowers on all classes of sheep country. Nevertheless, until some more definite conclusions are arrived at, it seems that the best Slogan should be “Avoid the use of rams showing hair in those portions of the fleece exclusive of the lower portion of the britch.”

In the work carried out by the Department of Agriculture during the past three years, an attempt has been made to gain some information as to what fleece faults from a. structural standpoint are particularly disliked by the wool-buyer: but it can be said that generally speaking the buyer pays far more attention to spinning quality and clean yield than he does to structural faults, and in consequence many wools that on microscopical examination are of a hairy type have been sought after quite as eagerly this season as ones that are distinctly of a pure wool Type,. It can, however, be said that the wool-buyer views the following with disfavour:

Excessive quantities of hair (dullcoloured, more or less straight fibres), mixed with pure wool fibres. When present only to a limited extent, no notice Is taken.

Thickened tips. In many wools the upper third of the Individual fibre is often to the eye very considerably thicker (coarser) than the lower third of the same fibre. The presence of short fibres (underwool). All these three faults are directly connected up with the presence of a

strong central core (medulla) in the fibres, and the production of really high class wool, would appear to mean the production of wool that is noamodulated. Harsh handling wool in all cases means the presence of medullated tissue; soft handling wool means the absence or comparative absence of such tissue. The question however, that is by no means settled, is whether animals possessing soft handling fleeces always produce soft handling wool under all conditions of feed and management, and likewise whether harsh handling animals al-

ways produce harsh handling wool, and transmit this characteristic to their offspring. Many breeders are confident that structural defects in the fibres are very largely influenced by climatic and other conditions, while other breeders are equally confident that structural peculiarities are entirely a matter of breeding, and are in no way dependent on outer influence. In order to decide whether true wool fleeces of the Romney breed were satisfactory to Bradford spinners or not, the Department of Agriculture sent two consignments of wool to the Leeds University for investigation. When Dr. Reakes was in London recently he was informed that no fault could be found with the wool. It would seem, therefore, that the alarmists from Bradford have little justification for their complaints, and that if, with the cutting up of the big estates and the breeding of sheep rather for the fiat pens than for the fleece rapid deterioration should set in, the Department of Agriculture will have the question in hand, and will be able to sound the alarm without help from outside.