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Wrinkles are evil. Just ask any woman over 30 -- and most of the world's merino sheep. Wrinkles in a merino sheep's skin can lead to fly-strike, an infection so deadly that many farmers remove skin on the sheep's hind in a controverisal technique known as mulesing.
But now an Australian organisation of sheep farmers claims to have eliminated the need for mulesing. Not by treating their sheep with Boots No.7 anti-wrinkle cream, but by breeding a new type of merino sheep that just don't have wrinkles on their bottoms.
As well as good news for the sheep, this means it'll also be easier for us to buy cruelty-free luxurious merino fashion soon.
According to Save The Sheep, an animal rights organisation, traditional merinos have wrinkled skin, which is ostensibly good because it means more wool per animal. But moisture gets trapped in these wrinkles and builds up odour. The odour attracts flies, which can cause infections so bad that the sheep can die. To smooth the skin, farmers cut off big chunks of the sheep's skin around the tail.
We had a chat with Dwain Duxson, who heads up Australia's Multi Purpose Merinos (MPM) organisation. Its members have bred over 800,000 wrinkle-free merino sheep in total so far.
"The merino breeding industry in Australia is very traditional and we've bred sheep with wrinkles for 150 years," Duxson explains. "About seven years ago we [MPM] decided we wanted to try and change this so we wouldn't have to carry out mulesing on our sheep."
Initially, sheep breeders were very cautious about the wrinkle-free sheep, but as Duxon says: "Our markets demand wool from sheep that haven't been mulesed and all of a sudden everyone has become interested. This led us [MPM] to set up the ingredient brand, Lamarée, which supplies retailers and designers with mulesing-free wool. The quality of the wool is the same -- if not better."
Both high-end designers such as Karen Cole and high street retailers like H&M already have non-mulesing policies, so expect wool sourced from Lamarée at a shop near you soon -- you'll be doing a lot of sheep bums a big favour.
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