Within-flock ranking of loose wool bulk and fibre diameter to predict wool lustre

J.J. Nicol

Department of Wool Science, Lincoln University, New Zealand

Proceedings of the New Zealand Society of Animal Production. 1991, 51: 319-322

There is a specialised market for lustrous wools. No objective measure of lustre is currently available. Elliott (1986) has suggested, on the basis of the correlation between loose wool bulk (LWB) and lustre (LS) in wools from a wide variety of sources, that measurement of (LWB) and average fibre diameter (AFD) might be a useful indirect selection criterion for lustre. The strength of the above relationships within flocks have, however, not been established.

Mid-side samples were taken from complete flocks of ram hoggets (n=390). Clean scoured yield, average fibre diameter and loose wool bulk were determined on all samples. Each greasy sample was independently assessed for lustre on a 7 point scale by three experienced wool appraisers. Within flock correlations between LS and LWB ranged from 0.36 to 0.58 for the best assessor (mean 0.48), much lower than the values (>0.90) obtained in Elliott's study. Inclusion of fibre diameter failed to markedly improve the prediction of lustre score. The co- efficient of variation was lower for LWB (4.7%) and AFD (5.7%) than for LS (27.8%). The significance of these results for wool measurement and selection programmes will be discussed.

Keywords: NZSAPAB; Wool; subjective measurement; lustre; bulk; objective measurement; within-flock ranking; fibre diameter

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