WOOL MARKET

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 April 1939, Page 3

WOOL MARKET

CHRISTCHURCH SALE. A HEAVY OFFERING. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH. April 12. A heavy offering comprising 29.612 bales will be placed before buyers at the fourth Christchurch wool sale on Friday. The sale is the final fixture for this centre, and will be followed by only two more, one in Dunedin on April 19, and one in Wellington on April 24. The offering is typical of a final Christchurch sale. It contains almost every sort of wool produced in the province from crossbreds to merinos and also includes a big proportion of West Coast wool. The quality is, as usual, not up to that of earlier sales, but is quite as good as that of a normal fourth sale offering. A lot of highcountry wool is included and late shorn clips from the foothills. The wool has opened up with a big proportion sandy and discoloured and showing signs of the weather. Some is of poor colour, tender, dusty and showing seed. The third sale catalogue was closed on January 7 and consequently some fairly good wool is included that missed that sale.

The exceptionally big catalogue has caused something of a rush in the stores, where space for displaying wool has been freely used.' The main reason is that a larger quantity of wool has been available this season because of the increase in flocks. The early closing of the catalogues for the first three catalogues were kept down to totals of about 24,000 bales, that figure, fixed before the opening of the season as the maximum at the main centres, having been observed in Christchurch more closely than in other parts of New Zealand. ■The first three sales of this season have seen 71,173 bales disposed of. Last season the sales were 92,601 bales and. in the previous season the record number of 100,858 bales was sold, but those two totals include the wool sold at subsidiary sales, probably amounting to 2000 bales in each case. It is possible that this season will see that total eclipsed. . •