This is not the time to prefer blondes

There is a tradition of “bloom dipping” sheep for show or sale – colouring their wool yellow or brunette or sometimes even pink – because some farmers think it improves the contrast between body and head and legs and emphasises a good conformation. The old way was to brown them slightly with peaty water but nowadays there are various colouring agents available.

The British Wool Marketing Board points out that now wool prices are going up, there is a worthwhile premium in leaving a white fleece white.

The board put out some advice on buying and selling in the run-up to the Bicester and Thame Sheep Fair, a big exchange of breeding sheep which it sponsors – coming up this year on Friday August 5.

Gareth Jones, producer relations manager, said the price of wool had made fleece quality a factor to consider again. He said: “Taking the time to seek out better-woolled sheep will pay in the long-run.”

Chief wool marketing officer, Mark Powell added: “Tinted wool resulting from bloom dipping is worth significantly less than clean white wool. Based on current prices, tinted wool is worth about 48p a fleece compared with white wool at £2.88 a fleece. Buyers are losing out on a significant amount of money by buying bloom-dipped sheep. There may be a belief that the sheep look better for it, but the farmers’ pockets will be much lighter as a result.”

But David Airey of Keighley, a sheep farmers’ spokesman in the NFU, said fleece prices were still generally too low for farmers to bother much about the difference.

He said: “The next clip is nearly a winter away and you would expect most of the colour to be washed out by then anyway.

“And as my father used to say, double nowt is still nowt. It might be a bit different for some of the downland breeds but my next cheque from the wool board will be about £560, compared to a cost in the region of £1,500 for clipping. I have friends that still burn the wool because it is not worth their while to pick it up and pack it up.”