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The oldest wool pool in the nation compiled over 15,000 pounds of wool Thursday in Maryville, getting wool from 40 producers in Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina.

The pool is about 95 years old. Of that, 6,000 pounds came from Mobile, Ala.

The 2008 East Tennessee Wool Pool was held all day at the Foothills Farmer's Co-op Feed Mill and Bulk Fertilizer Plant off U.S. 411 South in Maryville.

Dr. Warren Gill, a professor at the Middle Tennessee State University School of Agribusiness and Agriscience, for many years worked for the UT Agricultural Extension Service and with the wool pool. He still helps out with the state pool.

Also working with the pool was John A. Wilson, a Blount County UT Extension Service agent.

The Tennessee Sheep Producers and UT Extension Service sponsors the pool.

The local co-op provided the space to work with the wool and lets the pool sponsors store it there until it is shipped to the buyer.

Bill Inman, a grader for the state, graded and weighed the wool for each producer before it was put into a machine and each 300 pounds bagged in plastic for shipment.

The largest wool buyer in the world, Lemprerier of Australia, bought the wool, a lot of which will wind up in the huge textile industry in China.

"Some of the really good wool will wind up in suits, and wool that is dirty will be used for rugs," Gill said.

Short wool, mostly from lambs, will be used to make felt.

The superior quality wool crimps, meaning it is textured, strong and easy to spin, he said.

"We get some of the best prices in the country because they like the way we do it. We grade and bale it," Gill said.

White face wool brought $61 per hundred pounds, black face wool brought $53.50, burry (that with burs and trash such as straw in it) brought $45.47, and short lamb wool brought $42.50.

Records for the pool were kept by Bill Powell, secretary and treasurer of the Tennessee Sheep Producers Association.

Gill said five years ago there would have been a line of trucks at the co-op out to the road, but Thursday the lot was not even full. That does not indicate a decline in the state's sheep farming, according to Gill. Now a lot of producers are breeding sheep that have a coat similar to a cow's hair instead of wool, he explained. They shed like cattle.

Those sheep don't have to be sheared, and producers get more money for lambs than for wool anyway, Gill said. These are hardy breeds -- Katahdir and Dorpor.

"The sheep industry is growing in Tennessee," Gill said.

Throughout the day trucks backed up to unload wool in large plastic bags, paper feed sacks and burlap bags -- agricultural product processed in Blount County for export to the world.