Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 7, 1990 TAG: 9006060166
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KIM SUNDERLAND NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
And it's the same for sheep.
But since sheep can't take theirs off by themselves, someone has to do it for them. This is where sheep shearing comes in.
With thousands of sheep needing to shed the winter fluff, the fleece-removing profession is in great demand throughout Virginia.
"There is a shortage right now of professional shearers," said Steven H. Umberger, extension sheep specialist for the state. "There aren't enough shearers around the state to share the load."
The extension service lists 15 to 20 shearers who shear the 100,000 ewes in Virginia, a job that lasts from March to June. The season can extend through the summer, when lambs must be sheared.
Umberger said that over the next five years, at least one more professional shearer per year is needed to turn the situation around.
To become a good shearer, you've got to be trained. Classes are offered through county extension offices.
Extension agents teach begining classes in sheep shearing in Glade Springs and in Steeles Tavern. Officials are seeking locations for a third beginners' class and a professional school.
Beginners' classes are held in April and last a day and a half; advanced training in March takes three days.
While learning about sheep, wool and shearing techniques in classes, the only real way to get good is by "shearing literally hundreds of sheep," said Umberger, who works in the animal science department at Virginia Tech.
\ Clinton Bell, a 34-year-old farmer from Tazewell, has been shearing sheep part time for 18 years. And he's sheared a lot of sheep. Bell says his best job lasted 10 days, when he made 2,000 sheep bald. START JUMP TYPE HERE Last week, on a particularly clear early afternoon, Bell and his buddies were out at the McDonald property - a rambling 1,100 acre farm - to shear 130 ewes and 45 lambs. The job would take all day.
First, Bell and Henry Ray, a 23-year-old farmer from Rosedale who's been shearing part time for four years, set up their electric motors to operate the shears.
The hand piece, which includes the cutters, is attached to the motor with a flexible shaft that hangs down about three feet and moves up, down and around.
The high-speed blades move through the thick wool, rolling it off like peeling an orange. Bell said he usually grinds the cutters down to sharpen them, a task that's cheaper than replacing them after every job.
After getting set up, Bell puts on his shearing moccasins. Patterned after the footwear of New Zealanders, Bell's are simply four layers of burlap, tied on the top.
"They're easy to wear and real good at keeping your feet from getting caught up in the sheep," said Bell, who shears about 1,000 sheep to a pair. "The next-best things are sneakers."
Also in place is a sack rack, a contraption about 10 feet high that holds the burlap sack that holds the sheared wool. The sack holds 175 to 200 pounds.
"We'll get about six sacks filled," said Bill McDonald, 29. "We get about seven pounds of wool per head."
He is a seventh-generation farmer and part owner of the McDonald farm with his father James, 60, and brother James Jr., 32.
Once all the equipment is in place, the shearing begins.
Bill and James McDonald push the sheep forward through a small chute, four at a time.
A catcher, usually a muscular type who can handle a ram that weighs 300 pounds, will grab one sheep at the end and lead him to his barber.
The sheep tend to gripe a lot.
"Each one is an individual," said James McDonald. "Each one has their own personality, even if they don't know what's good for them."
Watching Bell or Ray work takes a quick eye; the process lasts only about three minutes. And during that time the art of sheep shearing unfolds.
With a hefty ewe plopped on her woolly butt by the catcher, the shearer takes her head in his hand and bends over her.
The ewe is fairly immobile in that position, and the shearer moves his cutters down her back, over her stomach and around her udders, with his feet and hand rotating the ewe as he moves the shears.
"Ideally, the shearers don't want to stand up between sheep," said David Crane, an art instructor at Tech. He is a friend of the McDonalds who was helping out that day. "Bending up and down can really hurt their backs."
It's a fluid process, and the wool almost always falls off in sheets. Another worker will pick up the wool, climb up the sack rack and drop in the bundle.
When the sack is almost full, after about 15 large ewes and rams have been sheared, that worker will drop himself into the sack and force the wool down so more can be packed in.
It's quite a sight to watch sheared sheep. After their cutting, they skip away, without even a yelp, and start munching on grass. There's no shock felt from the experience.
"This is good for them," explained James McDonald. "It's no good to leave all the fleece on them 'cause they get too hot. It's unhealthy."
During a break, the eight workers rode up to the farmhouse for Martha McDonald's cooking and then returned to finish the job. Bell was tired; he had sheared 56 sheep that morning in Giles County on his way to the McDonalds'.
Later in the fall, the Virginia-North Carolina Marketing Association will call the McDonalds to find out how much wool they have and tell them where to bring it when it's time to buy.
The association is a liaison between the wool producers and the corporate buyers. It works out the logistics of pricing, sets up the pools - which in the New River Valley are in Christiansburg or Pulaski - collects the wool, writes checks to the sheep herders and delivers the goods to the buyer.
This year, there's too much medium-grade wool, Bill McDonald said. Hence, buyers are paying half of what they paid last year.
"We're going in the hole shearing sheep this summer," Bill McDonald said. "Last year we got 80 cents a pound, and this year we're getting only 39 cents. But we gotta do it."
The McDonald farm, where sheep have been raised since 1763, participates in a federal program that subsidizes wool producers. Called the Agriculture Stabilization Conservation Service, the program was started in World War II when more wool was needed for Army uniforms.
Bill McDonald said the program helps because it pays about one-seventh of the cost of raising their sheep.
"There's been sheep on this farm for years," said James McDonald. "It ain't gonna change now."
Which is just fine for Bell and Ray.
"This job helps cash flow," said Bell of the $1.75 he's paid for each shaved sheep. "It helps it flow in."
by CNB