Adelaide Wool. Adelaide wool has a reputation for sound Merinos, the average quality being a little lower than for the Port Philip and Sydney wools. Its fiber is moderately fine, but not of uniform length; its color is not so good, and it contains a large amount of yolk.[6] Adelaide wool is used for worsted dress goods, weft (filling)[7] yarn up to 60’s, and certain worsted warps.[7] It is used for medium fancy woolens.
Van Wool from Tasmania. The climate of this island is well suited to the growing of wool, and produces excellent qualities, fine in fiber, of good length, and strong in the staple, which will spin as high counts as 70’s and 80’s worsted. This wool is useful for mixing with other good wools. Its color is very white, which makes it a useful wool for dyeing light shades. Its milling properties are good, and the shorter sorts are suitable for woolens.
New Zealand Wools are very supple, which make them valuable to the spinner. These wools are suitable for almost all classes of Merino and crossbred yarns. They are of good length, sound staple, have good felting properties, and are of good color. They are useful for blending with mungo and shoddy, to give to these remanufactured materials that springy, bulky character which they lack.
Cape Wools. Cape Colony and Natal produce merino wool that is somewhat short in staple, rather tender, and less wavy than some other wools. The sheep are not so well cared for, and are fed on the leaves of a small shrub. The absence of grass leaves the ground very sandy, and this makes the fleece heavy and dirty. Its color is fair, but it lacks elasticity. It is used chiefly to cheapen blends[8] of 60’s top.[9] The short wool is combed for thick counts for weft and hosiery, and is also used for shawls and cloths where felting is not an essential feature.
MERINO SHEEP
Wools from South America. These wools are of the same standard of excellence as the Australian wools, but they are generally deficient in strength and elasticity. Buenos Ayres and Montevideo wools are fairly fine in fiber, but lack strength and elasticity, and are deficient in milling properties; they are also burry. The climate suits the sheep well, and the feed is good, but the careless methods of classing and packing have earned for these wools a poor reputation that is well deserved.
The best 60’s wool is combed in oil, but a large portion of the shorter is combed and used in thick counts,—20’s to 36’s worsted for the hosiery trade.
Russian Wool. The staple of this is generally strong, and the fibers are of a medium thickness; the color is milky white. It is useful to blend with Australian or other good wools. It produces a good yarn, and is very often used in the fancy woolen trade and in fabrics that require to be finished in the natural color.
Great Britain Wools. These may be divided into three groups: (1) long wools, of which the Lincoln and Leicester are typical examples; (2) short wools, which include Southdown, Shropshire, Suffolk, and others; and (3) wool from the mountain or hilly breeds of sheep, such as the Cheviot, Scotch Blackface, Shetland, Irish, and Welsh.