Hampshire Down X Dorset Horn Part I

Every now and then you come across a fleece that is a cross-breed, in this case Hampshire Down crossed with a Dorset Horn.  The Hampshire Down is quite a dominant breed of sheep in terms of numbers, around the world.  The Dorset Horn, however, is a Conservation Breed.

This one I got for the princely sum of 99p plus postage, which was significantly higher due to weight and bulk.  Yeah, go on, laugh and ask "What's wrong with it?".  I thought that when my bid wasn't challenged only to be surprised when it arrived at how relatively nice it felt for my bargain price, although worried about that yellowish line half-way up the staple.  This was from Ebay and came from Chandlers Ford, Eastleigh, Hampshire and was sheared in June 2012.

It arrived at 2kg and after a quick sort and washing weighed 1.35kg.  I discovered that this fleece had 3 distinct qualities to it and separated the fleece based on these qualities.

Type I

Short curly locks, very much like Shetland, but with a lot of short black kemp like fibres in it.

These are pretty much combing out but those that don't fall out can probably be picked out later.  This part of the fleece weighed 265g and after combing and spinning I made a Double-Knit 2ply yarn of 114g/322m.  This was a yield of 43%.

It turned out that I couldn't pick all the black hairs out and so I wasn't happy with this and decided to dye it.  For some strange reason I picked the Lime Green shade ColourCraft All in One Dye.  I was initially horrified at the colour as I lifted the yarn out of the dye pot but then as the excess water ran out it lightened to quite a nice pastel shade of Lime, which made me quite happy.  That happiness didn't last though.  As I added the skein to some plain warm rinse water, most of the dye went for a swim in the water and I was left with a very sickly yellowish colour.  It couldn't be left in that state but I wasn't sure what colour to over-dye it with.  Whilst I deliberated that, I dyed the next lot of fleece Ultramarine Blue and then decided that I would add this skein to the dye that was left over from that dye pot.  Hey presto, a beautiful colour I think you would agree.

Rooed Shetland Fleece

Shetland Sheep are classed as one of the primitive breed of sheep and despite their genetic make-up having been "improved" on over many hundreds of years, whilst most modern day Shetland Sheep have to be sheared, there are still some genetic strains out there that still have the ability to naturally shed their fleece.  The fleece from these particular strain of Shetland can be naturally harvested from the sheep by a traditional method called "rooing".  Shepherds who know that they have some of these sheep in their flocks will often gently tug on their sheeps fleece around the normal sheep shearing time to see if the fleece is ready to come away naturally at "the rise", which is the name for the point on the locks where one seasons growth ends and the new seasons growth begins and this is a weak spot and will break off during preparation of a sheared fleece.

Once again, this Shetland fleece came from the same farmer in Morval, Cornwall, that all of my Shetland fleece have come from so far.  This is a Grey/White Rooed Shetland Lamb fleece and is absolutely beautiful.

I started out with 678g of fleece and after removing really, really short locks and washing it it weighs 428g, a massive 250g loss before I even get my combs out!

I noticed that some of it felt a little coarser than the main bulk and so I separated those locks out and prepared and spun them separately.  I will refer to parts of this fleece as Grade A (the best) and Grade B (the coarser stuff).

After I combed it, I was left with 52g of Grade B top and 238g of Grade A top, in a range of shades.

From the Grade B, I made a double knit weight 2ply yarn, 52g/110m and I called it "Snowy Owl".

From the Grade A, I made a double knit weight yarn, 2 skeins: 113g/337m and 119g/311m and again I called the colour "Snowy Owl".

Jacob Fleece and helping a farmer out

An ex-work colleague of mine has gotten in touch with me to see if I could help her farmer friend out.  The farmer friend is looking for someone to take a whole load of Jacob fleece off their hands and do what they want with it as they normally just burn it but would rather it put to good use if possible.  They don't have a large enough number of sheep fleece to be able to sell it to the Wool Marketing Board, which I think is 50+ fleece.  Usually small farms will put their fleece together to reach the required minimum amount to be able to sell it to the Wool Marketing Board and divide the monies up from that when it comes in but they are not in a position to do so.

Its a relatively local farm, about 18-20 miles away, in the pretty village of Elford, just outside of Tamworth, Staffordshire.

I had done some asking around of other spinners that I am in touch with via various online forums etc and I had some interest in them and off I went and collected 16 Jacob fleece, driving home in the hot sunshine with the windows down for some fresh air, phew-wwhhhheeeeee!  They did have a few more fleece but someone else had taken those, thankfully!

Some of the fleece had cotted areas (felted) but with the weather we had over the winter I am not at all surprised by that, its been pretty bad.  The only annoying thing, which was done through trying to be nice/thoughtful but turned out to be a pain in the butt and create a lot of work for me as a spinner, was that they had put straw down during shearing in a bid to keep the fleece clean and free of dirt.  I advised them that spinners would rather deal with dirt, which washes out easily than straw which is a pain to remove as it gets stuck in the fleece.  I sorted all the fleece out, removing as much straw as I could and photographed those that I did not want to keep, obviously I kept the best ones for myself, selecting 4 superb fleece and 1 fleece that was not good for spinning at all which I plan to turn into a rug for the lounge.

11 of the fleece found new homes with spinners up and down and the UK and a couple were posted to spinners in Europe.

Languid - Design SB168 large

This is the last of the Rowan Spray that I have and it is called Languid, a kind of pastel colour with blackish spots and splodges on it.  Quite pretty really but I just never knew what to make with it.  I am still using the same design as well.  I started and finished this on 16th June 2014.

This is a really pretty result from a not-so-sure-of-it yarn.

Steel - Design SB168 large

Onwards and upwards to the next without stopping.  Once again this is Rowan Spray but this time in shade Steel and again it only took me one day to make it, 13th June 2014.

I like this colour and its nice and soft too.

Glade - Design SB168 large

Getting on with using up the thicker yarns in my yarn stash I moved onto the next shade of Rowan Spray which is Glade.  Not the prettiest colour in the box and I have no idea what possibly possessed me to buy such a weird colour of yarn.  Camouflage wedding anyone?

This again only took me a day to make, starting and finishing on 12th June 2014.

Seascape - Design SB168

Ok, so I have come back to working my way through my yarn stash starting with the thickest of the yarns that I have.  I have some Rowan Spray yarn in various shades, which is a slightly felted single ply super bulky yarn of 60% Wool, 40% Acrylic and no longer manufactured.

I have decided to make the larger version of a design that I have already made a few times before, the morocco capelet and the twilight capelet, but this one has a second row of leaves, making it longer.

I cast on 11th June using size 15mm knitting needles, yes they are huge and its like trying to knit with a Mars bar or some similar chocolate bar.

This didn't take long to make at all, its thick yarn knit on thick needles and knits up super fast.

I really like the colour of this one, its a really nice blue.