How is Wool Processed ? | Animal Fibres | Economic Geography

In this article we will discuss about:- 1. Processing of Wool 2. Distribution of Wool 3. Types 4. Sheep Farming 5. Geographical Requirements.

Processing of Wool:

The wool is usually transported and auctioned ‘in the grease’ or as it came from the animal. The first operation is thus cleaning or scouring the wool. The wool must then be carded or combed in order to separate the fibres, spun, woven and finished. The methods of carding, spinning and weaving differ ac­cording to the type of material to be made.

There are basically two processes, producing either worsteds or woolens:

1. Worsteds:

Worsteds are made from long staple wool of the best quality and wool derived from rags, clippings and wasted pieces cannot be used. The scour­ed wool is oiled to make it easier to work and then combed in such a way as to separate the longer and shorter fibres from one another.

The longer fibres or tops, which can be used are combed out parallel with one another and are passed through various machines which stretch them and standardize their thickness, to that required for spinning. The shorter fibres or noils are rejected after carding but are used for woollen manufacture. When the suitable tops are spun they are twisted tightly to make a strong, smooth yarn. The yarn may be doubled if necessary to give it the required texture.

In making both worsteds and woollens it is also necessary to dye the yarn before weaving as the pat­tern of the fabric is woven into the cloth and not applied afterwards. The worsted is tightly woven to produce a smooth, patterned cloth of high quality. No further processing, such as fulling, is required.

2. Woollens:

Woollens can be made from a much wider range of wools than worsteds and are therefore more versatile. The rejected noils from worsted card­ing, shorter staple wools such as crossbred wools, woollen wastes from spinning and weaving mills, rags and clippings, known as shoddy and mungo, can all be utilized and other fibres, such as cotton, mohair, alpaca, or synthetic fibres can be added to the wool in various proportions to produce cloth with special properties.

After being sorted, scoured and oiled the wool is dyed if necessary and blended in the correct proportions. In the carding operation the fibres are mixed and combed into a criss-cross mass which is known as sliver. The fibres are loosely spun and woven. The cloth is then milled or fulled, which en­hances the natural tendency of the wool fibres to ad­here to one another and produces a felted appearance. The fulling also improves the strength and durability of the cloth.

All wool is not processed by the methods outlined above. Some is made into yarn for hand or machine knitting, usually using the higher grades of wool; some is made into specialized woollen materials such as tweeds, serges, blankets and flannel; and the coarser wools are processed to make carpet yarns.

There is an increasing tendency in the woollen textile industry to make cloth with a mixture of wool and other fibres, particularly synthetics, because, while preserving the traditional advantages of wool for warmth and absorbency, the man-made fibres give the fabric greater strength, better washing properties and improved shrink- and crease-resistance.

Distribution of Wool:

By far the most important of the animal fibres is wool, which is the long, curly hair of the sheep. The sheep was probably domesticated in Central Asia, and in the past it was traditionally kept in the countries of the Old World. It was important in Europe, Asia and North Africa.

When European colonists settled in the ‘new’ countries of the Americas, southern Africa, Australia and New Zealand, they introduced sheep farming. They found that at least as far as wool production was concerned, the climatic and other conditions in the new countries were probably better for sheep than in the Old World.

This combined with the decline in sheep rearing in Europe, because of competition from more intensive uses of land, to make the southern continents the major sheep-rearing areas of the world today. In countries such as Australia and New Zealand the sheep population far out-num­bers the human population, in New Zealand about 19 to one.

Wool is a valuable fibre in the cooler temperate areas because textiles made from it are very warm. The crinkly, fluffy wool fibres trap air and thus act as insulators. Wool is also elastic, absorbent of moisture, and is a hard-wearing and durable fibre. Wools differ in their staple length (the length of the individual fibres); in the thickness of the fibres; in durability, in lustre and appearance.

Types of Wool:

There are three major types:

1. Merino Wool:

The Merino sheep, which origi­nated in Spain and North Africa, has been greatly im­proved by selective breeding and yields the finest wool. Merino wools, which account for about one- third of the world wool production, are of long staple length and are used for making high-quality worsteds and knitting yarns. Merino sheep are kept chiefly in the drier, warmer regions of temperate latitudes.

2. Crossbred Wool:

Crossbred sheep and many of the breeds which originated in Britain, yield medium grade wools as well as meat and are kept for either purpose. Their wool is of medium length and is some­what coarser than the fine merino wool, but is still suitable for clothing.

It is used in mixtures with merino wool or alone to make woollen goods of medium qua­lity. Crossbred wool accounts for more than 40 per cent of the world’s wool and is produced in areas with higher rainfall and richer pastures.

3. Carpet Wools:

Carpet wools are coarser, thicker and more variable in quality than either merino or crossbred wools. They are derived from more mar­ginal sheep-rearing areas or from areas where wool is only an incidental by-product from sheep kept for meat. Much is derived from countries such as India, Iran, and Ethiopia. As its name suggests such wool is used for coarser purposes such as carpets, where dura­bility is of more importance than fineness of the fibres.

In addition to the above grades of wool there are a number of other varieties of wool derived from animals other than sheep. These are not true wools but have special qualities and thus, though production is small, are of high value. The long silky hairs of angora goats are used to make high quality woollen goods.

Angora goats originated in Asia Minor, where they are still kept, but they have also been introduced into South Africa, which is now the major producer of mohair, the wool derived from such animals. The soft downy hair of Kashmir goats is produced in the western Hi­malayas and is used for making cashmere shawls and other high-quality knitted garments.

The similar fine, soft hair of the alpaca and vicuna, animals related to the llama and native to the Andean plateaux of South America, is also highly prized, especially for garments such as coats, but is in very short supply.

Camel-hair, which has long been used among the desert peoples to make heavy, durable textiles, is also used in mixtures with other types of wool to make coatings, blankets, rugs and carpets of high quality. China is the major commercial producer of camel-hair.

Sheep Farming for Wool:

Sheep may be kept primarily for their wool or for their meat, but even the sheep kept for meat must be clipped regularly and will thus yield some wool. The geographical requirements for specialized wool and meat production are rather different, for the best wool is produced from sheep kept in drier, warmer conditions and the best meat comes from sheep kept on lush pastures in damper regions.

The most important wool producer in the world is Australia, so it is of interest to consider sheep-farming methods there. Methods in other wool producing countries are basically similar.

Sheep farms are very large in Australia and as many as 50,000 sheep may be kept. Generally speaking the sheep graze natural grasslands, though in some cases the pastures are improved by sowing clovers or grasses or by applying fertilizers to promote the growth of natural pastures.

With such large areas involved, this work is usually done by aircraft. Merino sheep are kept on the drier grass- and scrub-lands of the hotter interior, while crossbred sheep are kept on the better watered and improved pastures of smaller farms.

In the interior sheep rearing is the principal agricultural occupation while in more favoured areas sheep are part of a mixed farming economy. On the specialized sheep farms the sheep range over the land foraging for food. But they are not simply allowed to range over the whole farm or station at will.

They are kept in paddocks which are separated by wire fences. When the sheep have exhausted the grazing in one paddock, which may be many square kilometres in extent, they are moved to a new area. The fences also serve to keep out wild animals, such as kangaroos, rabbits and dingos, which would compete with the sheep for food or might harm the flocks.

The paddock system has several advantages. It helps to reduce overgrazing and to conserve the grasslands, for it ensures an even use of the pastures. It also allows some land to be held in reserve, ungrazed, to be used in case of drought, when the other paddocks have been exhausted. Man-sown hay is sometimes grown, harvested and stored against emergencies.

Drought is in fact a recurring problem in Australia and if several years in succession are dry, as in 1968—70, no precautions can prevent many animals dying for want of food and water. This makes it dif­ficult for farmers to know how many sheep to keep on their land. If they have overstocked, a bad year will cause great losses. When rainfall is heavier they must also resist the temptation to run too many sheep so that natural pastures cannot regenerate sufficiently to supply food for the sheep in drier years.

Pasture is not the only consideration. Much depends on the availability of water. Few surface streams flow perennially and so most sheep stations are dependent on artesian wells to water their flocks. Sheep can only wander about 5 km (3 miles) from water if they are to survive, and thus the spacing of wells, as well as the quality of the pasture, determines the size and grazing patterns of the flock.

Once or twice a year the sheep are rounded up for shearing. Teams of expert shearers travel from one sheep station to another to do this work. They use electric clippers and can each shear between 100 and 200 sheep in a day. The fleeces, which weigh between 4 and 10 kg (8 and 20 lb) are graded and baled and are sent to the nearest wool market. Buyers from all over the world attend the major auctions. Australia, which produces almost a third of the world’s wool, has twelve wool-marketing centres.

Geographical Requirements for Wool Production:

1. Climate:

A warm, rather dry climate is ideal. Temperate regions are better than tropical ones, be­cause in hot climates, the sheep produce short, coarse wool. Moderate temperatures, about 21°C (70°F) in summer, are best. A moderate rainfall of between 380 mm and 890 mm (15 and 35 inches), which in the warmer temperate areas creates fairly dry conditions, is ideal. The sheep do better if they are provided with plenty of drinking water, from wells or pipes, but prefer a dry environment.

Dry regions are also preferred for sheep farm­ing because, while they are suited to sheep rearing, they are of little or no use for arable farming or high-quality livestock production for meat. There­fore the use of semi-arid areas for wool growing has both natural and economic advantages.

2. Dry Ground:

Sheep do best where the land is well-drained. Damp ground and wet conditions encourage such diseases as foot-rot, or allow the spread of parasites such as liver fluke.

3. Pasture:

Sheep require a moderate food supply consisting of grasses and other herbaceous plants. They are therefore best kept in grassland regions. Both the richer grasslands of New Zealand or Britain and the poorer bunchy or tussocky grasslands of interior Australia or Patagonia are suitable. The sheep nibble the vegetation right down to the ground and therefore care must be taken in areas of poor grassland, where patches of bare soil intervene, to prevent over-grazing, as this might lead to the permanent impoverishment of the pasture or to soil erosion.

Although sheep can sur­vive on very poor pastures in semi-desert and even desert areas (on a nomadic basis) and are tolerant of both hot and cold conditions, they do best where there are adequate grass supplies. Because sheep kept primarily for wool thrive better in drier areas, sheep farms are often very large as the num­ber of sheep which can be kept on a given area is low where the vegetation is relatively sparse.

Sheep farms may thus be several hundred square kilometres in extent. In wetter areas farms are smaller because the grass is more abundant and of better quality. The flocks kept on sheep farms vary in size in accordance with the available pasturage, but in most areas each sheep requires 1.6-2 hectares (4-5 acres) to provide sufficient food.

Carrying capacity can be greatly increased by pasture im­provement. In general flocks are very large, ranging from 5,000 or 10,000 to as many as 50,000 in Australia for example. Yields of wool and the quality of wool can be improved by providing better pasturage. In New Zealand and Australia sown pastures lead to high productivity and in the U.S.A. fodder crops are sown for winter use. The use of improved pastures increases carrying capaci­ty, reduces the fear of overgrazing as well as in­creasing wool yields.