In Australia, the most commonly raised sheep are merinos, who are not native to the country and who have been specifically bred to have wrinkly skin, which means more wool per animal. This unnatural overload of wool can cause sheep to collapse and even die from heat exhaustion during hot months, and the wrinkles collect urine and moisture. Attracted to the moisture, flies lay eggs in the folds of the skin, and the hatched maggots can eat the sheep alive, a condition known as “flystrike”. Each year, millions of lambs are subjected to “mulesing” ― a crude mutilation in which sheep have huge chunks of skin and flesh cut from their backsides without any pain relief ― in a misguided attempt prevent flystrike, even though humane alternatives are available and in use by many Australian farmers.
The Australian wool industry promised to phase out mulesing by 2010 but then reneged on that agreement. Seeing that the industry had no intention of doing the right thing, PETA Australia and its affiliates have been talking with manufacturers and retailers around the world and asking them to boycott wool from mulesed sheep, virtually all of which comes from Australia. Please speak up for lambs by e-mailing international clothing retailer Uniqlo ― which is owned by Japanese company Fast Retailing ― and asking officials to stop purchasing Australian wool from mulesed flocks. Uniqlo is the fourth-largest retailer in the world with stores throughout Asia as well as in the US and the UK.
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For tips on writing effective letters, please see PETA US’ letter-writing guide.
More information about the cruelty of the wool industry is available at https://www.peta.org.au/issue/mulesing-a-barbaric-and-unnecessary-cruelty.