These days several gangs of shearers go to the different farms in the Pyrenees to shear the sheep from the cattle before going up the mountain. It is a necessary job for the welfare of animals. The wool of the sheep, year after year, was a complement in the economy, but currently it is the opposite. The farmers have to pay to shear the sheep, on the contrary, the wool has no price and nobody wants to buy it.
Despite being an excellent, sustainable and biodegradable fabric, it is committed to other materials. There are many farms that accumulate sacks full of wool from last year and cannot find someone who wants it, even at zero cost. Now, wool is considered a rejection material.
With the arrival of the summer heat, the gangs of shearers begin to work, which are usually made up of the shearers, who are in charge of shearing the sheep, someone who is in charge of tying the four legs of the animals and bringing the animal closer the shearer to facilitate his work and the baggers, in charge of gathering the wool.
For 34 years, only interrupted by two years of pandemic, the Sort City Council has organized the Xollada of sheep with scissors on June 24, an exhibition of this ancient trade. This demonstration reproduces the two types of shearing. On the one hand, the traditional shearing with scissors, which celebrates its 29th anniversary. And, on the other hand, for four years machine shearing has been incorporated, in such a way that the exhibition allows contrasting the modernized process with the traditional one that has been practiced in the territory for centuries.
In the past, when sheep were sheared with shears, the shearers needed between eight and ten minutes to shear the animal and during a day they used to make about 50 sheep. However, current machinery allows sheep to be sheared in a very short time.
Concern for the survival of popular mountain culture was one of the keys to moving forward with the company Vital Pirineus, which is committed to taking advantage of the wool of some twenty cattle from Alt Urgell and Andorra to make various items related to the trade of shepherd, such as blankets, masks, bags or pillows.
Some products that claim to be austere and sustainable and that have outlets in various countries such as France, Germany or northern Europe, as well as the United States and Korea. The initiative also contributes to value wool, which has practically ceased to be collected and is doomed to be treated almost as waste.
About ten years ago, Marta Esclusa decided to create Cal Sargantana, her own brand of wool felt products. She did it because her family has a sheep farm in Castellfollit del Boix (Bages) and to sell a product that they accumulated year after year.
However, when it started, the first obstacle was finding a place to wash it since in Catalonia all the laundries for wool craftsmen have disappeared. In fact, the closest place he has is in France and every year he has to take it there to get it back.
