Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 June 1875 — The Way to Shear Sheep. [ARTICLE]

The Way to Shear Sheep.

In the first place, procure a pair of shears that will retain a sharp edge after the blades are put in proper order. No man can shear at all satisfactorily with poor shears. After they are gTound true on the edges let them be sharpened on a fine-gritted oil-stone. The cutting edges of the blades should be ground beveling, neither too little nor too much. Let the bevel be about one-third as much as the bevel on the cutting edge of a planeiron. In opening up the neck or shearing the belly, when it becomes necessary to open the wool, let the shears be worked in gradually, cutting the wool of an even plane close to the skin until they are in and underneath the wool as far as they will go; then raise them, tearing the fleece open. Thus commence at the point of the shoulder, working up toward the head. This prevents cutting the staple along this neck and makes a better job. Each stroke of the shears should be clear and complete, and made close to the body. If a miscut be made let it go at that; for if you do leave a half inch of wool at that spot you get it next shearing, and if cut now it will be too short to be of any use" to the manufacturer, and will only injure m his estimation the Earcel or wool in which it is discovered. i shearing on the floor a man has better control of his sheep. If shearing on a bench, cateh the sheep by the left hind leg, back it toward the bench and roll it

over thereon; set it up on its butt, and then, as you stand with your left foot on the bench, lay the sheep’s neck across your left knee, with his right side against your body. . Now take the two fore legs under vour left arm and begin about the center of the belly and open the fleece fore and aft. Shear what would he the left side of the belly if the sheep were on his feet, also the left side of the brisket. Now cut off all tags from the inside of the hind legs with a pair of old shears and shear the breech as far as yoq can reach in this position. Return to the point of the shoulder, going up under the wool with the shears as above described to the butt of the ear; now shear Around, taking off the fleece as an entirety and including the foretop clear around the neck. You will proceed thus down the left side, taking the left foreleg by the way and shearing as far around the sheep as practicable while holding it in the position described, which will be tw’b or three inches past the spine. On reaching the hind leg, say about the stifle, you will then insert the shears at the inside of the hocks (wool below that point is commonly tags) and shear around that leg back to where you left off on the stifle joint. Should the sheep persist in kicking at this stage place the palm of your left hand on the stifle joint, which causes the leg to lie out straight. Shear clear around to the breech, or the place shorn when ■working on the belly taggings, and go clear around past the tail, so that were the sheep standing on its feet everything on the left side, including one to three inches on the right side from the spine, from head to tail, and including the whole tail, shall be shorn. Now, taking the* left hind leg (the one that is shorn) in your left hand, swing the sheep around with its spine directly toward you, being careful that some of the fleece goes under him, for his left hip bone, which is shorn and bare, now comes in contact with the boards, oausing him to lie uneasily. Now return with the shears to the head or neck and go down the right ride, taking in the two legs and right-hand side of the brisket and belly. You may now finish up, trimming off any tags that may have escaped, including that wool off the legs below the knee and hock joints. It will be seen by this description that the wool all through the operation will hang down and have a tendency to fall apart. This is counteracted in a greater measure if the sheep be shorn on the floor than on a bench, for though the same manner of opening up and shearing is pursued, still, as the shearer goes down each side, the sheep lies on the opposite side, and the distance from that point of the fleece whence the* wool is hanging to that point on the floor where it is resting is not so great as where the sheep sits on its rump.— N. Y. Herald.