[Marches Farmer]

If you're trying to sell 50 Southdown fleeces on the world market your chances are .....0.  If the BWMB consolidates your clip with that of the other Southdown flocks across the UK then you're talking about enough tonnes to make it of interest to a mill turning it into finest quality men's suiting material, and so on.  The Board hold monthly worldwide auctions and have the knowledge and contacts to find a market for everything from coarse old mountain fleeces to finest Downland shearling.  Yes, it would be nice to get more for fleeces but I take the l-o-n-g view - once chemical byproducts like acrylic are no more what could be greener than a fibre that grows on grass?

[Fleecewife]

If you're trying to sell 50 Southdown fleeces on the world market your chances are .....0.  If the BWMB consolidates your clip with that of the other Southdown flocks across the UK then you're talking about enough tonnes to make it of interest to a mill turning it into finest quality men's suiting material, and so on.  The Board hold monthly worldwide auctions and have the knowledge and contacts to find a market for everything from coarse old mountain fleeces to finest Downland shearling.  Yes, it would be nice to get more for fleeces but I take the l-o-n-g view - once chemical byproducts like acrylic are no more what could be greener than a fibre that grows on grass?

Absolutely 

[madcat]

Agree with Marches farmer. Wool board is the only way for most producers to market their product.

My reason for asking is  that I'm hoping for the fleeces from some of the Sheep I'm temporarily minding but didn't know if there was any paperwork needed or any problems to be caused by me being given them.

I don't know why wool isn't more valued, it's way warmer than acrylic and grows naturally. My spinning friend refers to acrylic as Hair of the Ack.

[Tiva Diva]

Yep, I agree with other posters that the BWMB does a great job. They won't necessarily give the best price for unusual wools though - I sell most of my Portland fleeces to hand spinners (Hi guys  ) and get some spun into yarn by a local mill too. They're not some Nazi organisation though - they're quite happy to let you sell your fleeces privately if you want to!

[JulieWall]

So registration with the wool board isn't compulsory unless you want to exhibit at shows then?
Funnily enough, after stating that the membership issue had never crossed my radar I read something about it today in a book a friend lent to me. Nothing ever then twice in a few days, would you believe it!
I don't want any more paperwork though so I'm going to assume the BWMB have no interest in me until they come knocking at the door, lol

I once went on a trip to the wool staplers at Market Harborough with the Coventry Guild of spinners weavers and dyers, it was fascinating. We had great fun and were allowed to climb into the bins to see the wool - heaven for a fleece sniffer 
I seem to remember buying some nice fleeces to take home too. In those days my main source for buying fleece was the goat show and small farming event at the NAC Stoneleigh, long since cancelled. The selection was never all that brilliant and anything decent was always pricey.

 

[Fleecewife]

It seems to be something you are meant to do, but no-one checks as far as I can see, if you are producing just a few fleeces, especially if they are from breeds whose fleece they don't want anyway.  They could hardly enforce a rule to make you sell to them when it costs more to collect your clip (or deliver it to them) than you get paid for it.  Last time I checked a few years back, they were paying 2p/kg for Hebridean fleece 

There really is no paperwork for the Wool Board, once you've initially registered, except once a year when you are informed of collection centres etc, and writing your number on the entry form if you are showing rolled fleece.   I have never once been asked why I haven't sent them my clip, which I never have in 19 years of keeping sheep.

I can only tell you my experience, not what the actual 'law' is 


There was a big ruction a few years back when an Irish company started buying up large amounts of fleece.  I think in the end it was agreed that even big producers could sell to them if they wanted to, but that they would not be able to sell to the Wool Board if they later changed their minds and wanted to come back into the fold.  I don't know if the Irish company are still trading.

[JulieWall]

Does anyone know what you get paid for a Suffolk or Texel type fleece, assuming it is nice and clean, skirted and no second cuts? There is always far more than I need each year, I tend to cherry pick the best parts of each fleece and discard the rest ...... most of my discards went into our hugels last year.

[SallyintNorth]

I think the Wool Board price by the sheet (the correct term for the humungous sacks), so take an average of what they find in each sheet.

Firstly, there is no tariff, you don't know in advance what you will get overall, and it varies year on year according to what they manage to sell the clip for.

You get paid an 'advance' on submitting your clip, which is the very least they expect to be able to get for it, and will get the 'balance' payment the following year once they've sold the clip and know what they can afford to pay out.  Some years the balance is tiny, some years it's better.

The 'advance' payment tariff is published, so you could always ask for sight of that before deciding what / how much of your clip to submit.  But it's no indication of what the final payment would be, really.

If we send our whole clip, the last couple of years we've averaged about £3/sheep.  Ours are commercial Texel type and Charollais type sheep, with about 10% being North of England Mules.  Apart from the mules, our fleeces are outstanding for the type (though I do say so myself  - I feel entitled, having had so many handspinners now wax lyrical about our fleeces  )

When I take fleeces out of the clip for my spinning friends, BH charges me £5/fleece because of course I am taking the very very best of the best out, so may be impacting the average grading we get when the graders open the sheets. 

You shouldn't send the discarded bits of the fleeces you've used yourself to the Wool Board - you certainly wouldn't get much if anything for skirtings.  They want clean whole dry fleeces, properly wrapped, no daggings, no belly wool or second cuts.  Yes they will pay more per fleece if they're properly skirted but we tend to just pull off actual dungy bits when we're wrapping for the Wool Board.  The industrial processing can remove all the branding paints etc too, whereas for handspinning any painted wool will be discarded.  (Raddle washes out, as does the spray can marker, but branding paint and the original type of rudd do not.)

The Wool Board do publish a chart showing the likely payment per kilo by breed, so you could ask them for that.

I have a spinning friend really wants to try a Suffolk fleece - if you get a nice one, please contact me   (Hoping we could arrange transport by TAS- and/or Ravel-courier!)

[Dogwalker]

this any help?

http://www.britishwool.org.uk/YourSheep.asp?pageid=49

[Hillview Farm]

Sally if your friend is interested I have some very suffolky Suffolk crosses!

[SallyintNorth]

Thanks hillview, but probably no thanks.  She just really wants to try a Suffolk, because if she were to have her own sheep, she likes the look of Suffolks, so, as she spins, it'd be good to know if she'd like their fleeces!

[SallyintNorth]

Oh well done, Dogwalker  - I'd forgotten they had the breed/price matrix online (complete with nice pics )

[madcat]

How much do you think would be a fair price to pay friendly farmer for a Fleece, it will be chosen for me by a non spinner.

Can any body remind me where I can find the downloadable information about what spinners require of a fleece.

[SallyintNorth]

Can any body remind me where I can find the downloadable information about what spinners require of a fleece.

The useful links are in this post in the Spinning Resources thread.   

How much do you think would be a fair price to pay friendly farmer for a Fleece, it will be chosen for me by a non spinner.

It depends on the breed.  If it's 'just' a commercial sheep, then a fiver is reasonable, £7 or £8 if it's really nice and/or you want to encourage the farmer .  If it's a Bluefaced Leicester, then quite a lot more, as the farmer would get quite a bit more for that from the Wool Board.  Romney ditto - the fleece is worth less per kilo than BFL, but a Romney fleece is humungous and weighs a lot of kilos, whereas a really good BFL fleece is very fine and mostly air, so can weigh very little.  (And the Wool Board pay by weight.)  Other longwools (Wensleydale, Teeswater, Lincoln Longwool) ditto on the weight - a lot of kilos!

I would urge you to print off the leaflet on Selling Fleece to give to the person who will pick the fleece for you.  Non-spinners generally look for the wrong things, and are likely to select a fleece that holds together like a rug instead of one that falls apart and looks like a lacy cobweb if you hold it up.

[madcat]

The fleece will be a Zwartbles one, I want to be sure of giving a fair price.

Will download the info on selecting fleeces for spinners and pass it on. Thanks for the advice and links.