Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
PETA Strikes Again
I recently read an interesting but outrageous article in the Wall Street Journal regarding the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).
It appears that PETA has gotten their claws into retailers such as Duluth Trading Company and Lucky Brands and their marketing of items made of wool. PETA recently erected billboards in Boston and New York’s Times Square that display a nude picture of actress Alicia Silverstone with the phrase “Leave Wool Behind.” PETA and the Humane Society of the US is alleging that shearing sheep is inhumane and harmful to the animals. Most veterinary practitioners recommend an annual shearing. Weighed down by too much wool a sheep can suffer heat stress, inability to feed babies, lack of vision and infestation.
Both companies have backed off their “compliance” with PETA demands upon learning the truth of the matter, but how many lemmings have the image of bloody sheep in their head? This movement can only hurt ranchers who have a vested interest in maintaining healthy, happy sheep and providing clean wool as they have for centuries.
These animals rights groups do much more harm than good. Yes, I’m lumping them all together because of their shotgun approach to animal welfare. My local Humane Society does an exemplary job but the Mothership, like all these groups, seem to exist for the benefit of their executives.
How many contributed dollars went into the large billboard in Times Square?
I wonder where they stand on the extermination of rats in NYC?
Published in General
How long will you hush per ounce, and how much beer are you willing to drink? ;)
Dumb question from an ignorant city boy. Can’t you shear them with some giant sized Wahl razor with a blade guard like the barbers use? Do you have to shear it down the skin?
Or an industrial Epilady?
Not a dumb question at all. Had to look up “Wahl razor,” and I think the sheep clipper actually is a “giant sized Wahl razor” sort of thing.
Here’s something very similar to what I use: https://www.osterpro.com/products/clippers/oster-shearmaster-shearing-machine—single-speed/078153-003-000.html
Mine is actually a “variable speed” model, because adjusting the speed makes it easier to cope with the different grades and fineness of the wool, and also helps if you are shearing angora (mohair) goats, which we’ve also had in the past but don’t have at the moment.
The cutting mechanism is of two parts–the “comb” which has a variable number of teeth, and which “combs” (duh) through the wool or hair. More, or fewer teeth depending on the fineness of the wool (sheep) or the hair (goats), and the “blade” which is what actually does the cutting.
Here’s a sheep-shearing video by a guy who’s obviously not a pro (sort of like me) who’s careful about what he does, and who, with his wife, is obviously kind to his sheep. Shearing them is a bit of a struggle, if you don’t do it for a living, because you don’t really do it often enough to get comfortable with the physical aspects. Much of it is a balancing act, when you’ve got a 250lb sheep you’re trying to get situated and who doesn’t want to be there (the sheep are not the least bit grateful for your efforts to keep them cool, clean, and pest-free, you can be sure of that). Professionals can shear a sheep in about three minutes. It takes me about 10-12. There are not very many women sheep shearers, I do know that.
I’m sure this has already been said, but I thought wool was harvested, renewable, energy saving, responsible, clean and green. When did all this change?
I guess I’ll have to go to cotton, if I can still find it.
It’s not vegan, tho, because it ”exploits” an animal.
Can we exploit bees? How about earthworms?
Exploits? I run a small chain of haberdasheries and barber shops, the latter’s clientele is almost exclusively by sheep and goats. And they tip well.
My bumper sticker reads: Honey Is Theft. (But I love it so!)
You monster!
Cotton is racist.
I know. That’s why I didn’t vote for him.
Hmm, no on bees, but I haven’t heard anything about earthworms. I’ll bet they haven’t really thought about those yet.
I had three mohair goats as pets, once. One spring, the shearing got away from me, and I didn’t hire someone to do it. (I couldn’t do it myself-city girl). They looked like Rastafarians by winter. Then they started falling down. I had to check them several times a day, and right them, because they would often end up on their backs. Their coats were so long, and wet, and heavy, that they couldn’t get up. I couldn’t have them sheared, because they would freeze. It was a terrible winter.
A mountain lion came along and killed them all one night, for sheer entertainment, four years later. I loved those sheep. Wiley little devils, and fast as anything. RIP; Breakfast (white), Lunch (brown, white, and black), and Dinner (solid black).
Don’t give them ideas!
The script across the top of the rear window of my car says:
Fishing Kills Worms — And Fish — Say NO to Sole.
Righteous, yeh?
So is it true that a poorly shorn or a torn or parted shearing is worth a lot less than a perfectly shorn one?
Is that gimme a beer or I’ll keep explaining?
Eventually, the worms exploit you.
OMG, you had me going!
Huh. You mean sort of like facebook. Yeah.
How many times have I wandered into a small country store ostensibly for a coke, and wandered directly to the cold case with the worms and bought a tub. And brought them home. Not even fishing.
“You’re safe now! So please, please tell me how to rescue the princess.”
I… I just don’t get the quote.
It’s not a quote, Flick. This is real-time now…go!
In all seriousness, this is the part they don’t seem to get: that all life depends upon other life and, inevitably, on other death. If we don’t eat the sheep, something else will—mountain lions, feral dogs, vultures, worms, the roots of trees.
A relative once complained to me that human beings aren’t part of the natural order of things: “Nothing even eats us!” he complained. And I said no, baby. Not to worry. I’ve seen bodies that have been Out In Nature and believe me… we do get et.
Yes. In a perfect world, you don’t want “second cuts” (in which you take more than one swipe at the same area, so instead of, say, wool that’s five inches long, you end up with four inches long from the first cut, and then the fifth inch, closest to the skin you get with the second cut. Those short bits devalue the fleece, because they have to be removed before it can be processed further by a hand spinner (hand spinners will pay a lot for a “perfect fleece”). Naturally, you don’t want bits of skin in the fleece either, ugh. And when you’ve shorn the thing, if you’ve done it properly, and it’s come off the way it should, you “skirt” it, which means you remove the dirty bits of wool from around the tail area, and the bits of belly wool that usually have hay or grass in them, and anything else that doesn’t look fine or clean. A poor job of skirting is also something that reduces the value. The best fleeces for handspinners are those which have a very consistent fiber all over (fine, coarse, crimpy, straight, but consistent all over), are clean and well-skirted, and have almost no second cuts. Other fleeces around here go to what’s known, phonetically, as the “wull pull” the local co-op, which isn’t quite so fussy.
Wool might be one of the most ethically derived fibers we have, as it doesn’t involve the killing or even harming of any organism.How much more ethical can you get than that? And why do activists place the lives of animals above that of plants? Plants are living organisms too? What because they don’t have a nervous system they don’t have rights? I call this phylogenetic bigotry! Plants are the only ethical organisms harming no one and producing everything.