We love making products with local island wool. We’ve shared a few stories about the start of the process – shearing the sheep – and lots about the weaving side of things. So we thought it’s time to shine a light on what happens in the middle: getting from Skye fleece to Skye Wool yarn.
The local sheep are clipped (sheared) in June or July. You can find out more about that in our Summer Clip blog. We use a mixture of white wool from Cheviot sheep, and brown which mainly comes from Hebrideans, Black Cheviot, Zwartbles or Ryeland.
The first step is to collect the fleeces, or people drop them off with us. We buy from more than 30 local crofters and farmers from all around the island. It can involve quite few scenic trips with the trailer, best done on a fine day …
The fleeces then have to be graded. This involves carefully examining each fleece to select the best wool to be spun into our special yarn. Last year we invested in a spacious new shed so we can grade and store all our local fleeces on the croft. It’s big but still fills up fast!
Wool grading is a lengthy but essential process. We’re looking for wool that has a soft handle and good ‘crimp’ to it. Crimp is the fibre’s natural waviness which makes the wool springy and creates pockets of air, great for warmth. The best wool tends to come from the sheep’s side shoulders and the top of the hind legs. The white wool we buy comes from one-year-old sheep, called hoggs, and the brown wool comes from both hoggs and older ewes. The younger the sheep, the better the fleece – so less needs to be removed.
We’ve been learning this ‘on the job’ and getting quicker at it every year, which is good because we’ve steadily increased the amount of wool we’re buying. It’s hard work but I love getting ‘hands on’ with the wool.
We grade out everything that’s not good enough quality. We remove the ‘kempy’ wool – brittle, coarse, hollow fibre usually located at the lower hind legs (britches). We take out wool that’s heavily coloured with marking paint or tangled with heather, grass or other vegetation. We also remove the belly wool which has short fibres and can be discoloured, and the grotty bits (technical name, ‘daggings’) around the sheep’s bottom. Nice.
None of this goes to waste, mind you. It’s a brilliant mulch on the veg patch. We’re also experimenting with getting some thick, hard-wearing yarn spun for us for use in floor mats.
When we’ve finished grading it’s time to start packing the wool – another long job. We graded over 2000 kilos of wool last year, resulting in a total of 20 bags. No wonder Roger looks happy when it’s done.
The next step is to send the graded fleeces off for washing (also called scouring), carding (separating into individual fibres) and spinning into yarn. We can’t do this locally for the quantities we need so we send it off to a spinning mill in Yorkshire. They do a great job.
Four months or so later the Skye Wool yarn arrives back in Skye, ready for weaving. It’s always an exciting moment! We create four natural shades of by blending white and brown wool in different proportions: all white, all brown, 85/15 white/brown to get a light grey, and 60/40 to get a mid-grey. This gives us a lot of potential for patterns even before getting any of the yarn dyed. Then it’s time to get weaving…
Want to see what we create with this yarn? Have a look at our current Skye Wool products in the online shop and find out more about Skye Wool.
See more in our Fleece to Yarn video