Trash to Treasure

A mountain of Alpaca Fiber

One of the things important to complete before winter is cleaning and storing your wool. The first steps for wool processing are shearing it from the animal and once it's off, skirting or removing the filthiest parts of the wool from what you'll retain. This year we have over 20 lbs of alpaca fiber most from a friend that has asked us to clean, spin and knit/crochet into gifts for her family. Fiber prep from animals that enjoy rolling in the dirt and rustling through bushes can be a lengthy task and our first step is to remove as much of that dust, dirt, vegetation and second cuts (those shorter pieces that are accidentally cut twice and too short to use) from the fiber before we wash it.

---

For years we've been saving an old warping reel for such a time as this.  It was going to the trash heap and Mom saw it's potential for this very project and 'rescued' it from some of our first fiber friends. Oh, the joys of fiber things found.
This week, Tech was tasked with creating a solution to our needs while Mom was treating her nail pierced foot. (Just a note here, Epsom salt and clay are your best friends with any kind of deep wound.) Using what we had available: nails from a yard sale and .5" X .5" grid wire mesh left over from rabbit house/run project, he set to work wrapping the outside of the wooden structure to make what would become...

the fiber tumbler. Around here, we don't just tumble the fiber, we blow it out at the same time, much like we do to our angora rabbits! To clarify, we do that ( with our blower shown here )  while the fiber is on the rabbit, thus avoiding the need to do it after harvesting. Tumbling and blowing out your fiber isn't a necessary step nor is it used by everyone, but it is really helpful; while moving out a lot of debris, it opens up the locks of fiber making it easier to pick out the larger bits of vegetation afterward.  Yes, there is more picking, combing and brushing to do - even before it makes it to the washing machine, dye pot, drying rack or carder...

Angora light, cleaner and fluffier, on the Left. How it begins, on the right.

We have certainly learned to appreciate all that the fiber mills do to present a spotless roving for spinning, but keep in mind, most people who claim to be allergic to wool, are actually allergic to the chemical residue left after 'Industrial Mills'  actually burn off the vegetation with a harsh concoction. We take our time and utilize the same natural washing supplies we use on our own clothes, to keep our fibers as soft and clean as possible; that's while you'll occasionally come across bits of VM we may have missed. It's also one of the reasons users have been pleased to be able to work with our fibers, when they cannot touch or wear others' next to their skin.
You can still see bit of VM (vegetable matter) in the fiber after it's tumbled and blown, but it will be a lot easier to pick & comb clean. You'll also notice how much more compact the 'before' fiber is. After sitting in bags, it can really condense.  You can peak at all the action here:

We do not have a leaf blower, instead, that is the top part of our shop vac used like one - perfect! We found that, although it's hard to capture on video**, the dirt releases much more readily when the tumbler is keeping a steady speed. This fiber looks pretty good and we had already blown it out a bit before we got this video shot, but the dirt just blows away when it's first begun. Frankly, that's much preferred to inhaling it and getting on your face and arms while prepping it for washing. Of course, it's not perfect, we do have some fibers that begin to escape after being blown a bit - we're figuring out the learning curve - but for our homestead, this piece of 'trash' is our new treasured fiber tool!

**Thanks to Tech, we have some great new video that can show the dirt kickin' up and flying out...