Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-08-29
SHEEP SHEARING IN ARIZONA.
Many Picturesque Phases of Life in
the Far West.
From the Brooklyn Eagle

From the Brooklyn Eagle.
Just now is the Salt River valleys busy
time, for Salt River valley is steadily gain
ing reputation as wool center, and now
is the time when the sheep come down."
They come down in the Salt river region
rather earlier than they do elsewhere so its
season opens earlier and the buyers flock
there from all over the country to get the
first of the wool crop. The greater part OF
Salt rivers supply. however. is snapped up
by Kansas City and Chicago. though more
and more of it is finding its way to the At
lantic coast each year.
This year has been in every way red
letter year for the wool growers Their
crop is beating all records both in quality
and quantity The climatic conditions have
been peculiarly favorable during the past
winter. To be sure the storms have been
numerous and some of them severe but
what little damage they have done is more
than balanced by the splendid condition in
winch they have left the ranges. The sheep
themselves are in better condition than
they have been for years. Their yield OF
wool has increased about % per cent and
1t is of a superior quality, so that 1t is SELL
ing at an advance of about 33 1-3 per cent
over last years price, wool now bringing
from 10 to 15A cents pound against 10 to
tlt2 cents last season. And the sheep as
mutton brings better prices than ever be-
fore, so that all in all the wool industry is
looking up.
This period when the sheep come down is
busy time in a sheep country-busy and
picturesque. Spring has spread a Garnet @:
green and gold all down the mountain sides
for 1t is the time when the peoples and
other yellow desert flowers are all abloom
ana over this marshaled by the Basque,
French or Mexican herdsmen, the sheep
come drifting down in great white fiocks
from their ranges on the sides of the rugged
ARIZONA mountains into the valley of dis
content The discomfort. by the way gives
voice to their grievances ali the way down
a perpetual plaintive lamentation punctured
by the sharp barking of the shepherd's dogs
and the "hee-haws" of the knowing little
pack burros.
Each shearer can clip about 100 sheen a
day. The corrals are divided into compart-
ments, some for sheep whose troubles are
yet before them, and others for those that
nave passed through the ordeal and
emerged looking very thin and sorry in
their denuded state. And as it is done in
Arizona, shearing surely is an ordeal The
men work rapidly, but with a reckIessness
liat would aStonlSh a caretaking eastern
FARMER. Each man grabs his victim by the
leg and throws her her back between
his feet and clips away regardless of the
legs neck and feelings of the Door sheen
winch stands it without protest. One has to
nave seen an Arizona shearing to realize
the full fact of the biblical las a sheen be-
fore her shearers is dumb
AS soon as pen full has been sheared tba
sheep are sent into another little corral
where those that have been the most Sc
Hereiy cut are given medical treatment
Ihat Is, stick with a swab of wool at the
END OF 1t is dipped into healing and disin-
Iecung lotion and then plunged into the
wounded portion Not very elaborate treat
ment, but effectual! Then. before being
turned out into larger corral with theiT-
shorn mates, they are marked with their
owners special mark-not branded, for no
not iron is used-merely marked with lamn-
piack. For instance. man whose special
mark is a circle a baking powder can
to mark with. He dips it into a pan OF
lamphlack and impresses it on the sheep's
back just over it's tail.
before the sheep are turned loose On the
desert or sent back to the range they are
put through the dipping vat both to cure
them OF scab and to act as a tonic for their
wool. -e