@chameleon54 wrote:I actually visited the Appledores farm many years ago and was shown around their fine wool shedded sheep. It was a very simple operation, set up in a dissused shearing shed and made out of recycled materials. The Saxon / Merino sheep where all whethers and fed the same food ration twice a day at the same time. Each sheep was individually penned and they had the radio playing clasical music as they believed it kept the sheep calm and content....
Everything had to be very consistent to ensure no breaks in the tensile strength of the wool and the wool they produced was absolutely magic stuff. All up a very interesting excercise.
That's interesting because superfine wool usually comes from "stressed" sheep. That is why superfine breeders will often run them on steep hills. They don't physically stress them out, but roaming on the hills stresses them enough to make the wool finer.
My oldest Merino got so sick about 6 years ago, he almost died. Severe lactic acidosis, which triggered a Barberpole explosion. None of the vets believed he survived (6 weeks of very intensive care on my part, around the clock). The results were, his wool broke off and fell out.,.....just what he needed in June! I'm talking pink skin bald.
When his new wool grew, it was the finest anyone had ever seen. They estimated 11-12 micron. After that, it stayed superfine, but around 14 micron. These days his wool doesn't grow as long due to advanced age, but the wool broker loves it!
