Fleece angst
Posted: Thursday 19 June, 2014
Bleh! I'm not good out of my comfort zone, although I should be used to it by now.
Twenty sheep sheared a few weeks ago - 19 fleeces in boxes, comprising 7 from gimmers (one white, six coloured) and 12 from ewes (three white, 9 coloured). And I don't know what to do with them :-(
I have sold single fleeces privately in the past (as opposed to the Wool Board, who don't really want my we bag of coloured fleece anyway) but it's a futter, boxing and posting. I sold them as a lot last year, which was better, but I just have the feeling I could be doing more with them. If I knew what I was doing :-)
As a non-knitter, non-spinner, non-crafter, a lot of the terminology means nothing to me. Ply and DK and Arran - over my head along with worsted tops and roving. My Dad, who spent a lifetime in the wool industry, will be spinning in his grave. Pity knowledge isn't hereditary :-)
The cost of getting fleece processed into balls of wool seems quite expensive and I'm anxious that I don't incur a substantial processing bill then be unable to sell the finished product at a price that covers the costs.
Bleh, going to see my cows :-)
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Comments
Barbara Edmunds
Hi Rosemary, You could get a spinning wheel and learn to spin? I spin and my daughter dyes the wool and we have just started selling the wool. Also I run a spinning class. I am a smallholder and quest what I have only got a English Longhorn cow (love my cow) but you never know I may get a couple of sheep next year, save me having to buy the fleece.
Sally
Rosemary, how about a peg loom? You don't have much fleece prep to do ad there is no spinning/knitting
Colleen
Hi, Rosemary
not sure how much you get for your fleece, but if you can't sell it , it makes a great mulch, keeping weeds down and the slugs and snails don't like it . Afterwards it composts down into the soil to enrich it
SallyintNorth
Barbara, I love Rosemary and I love spinning, and I love getting people started spinning. But I would not want to teach Rosemary to spin for a gold pig ! lol. (No offence, Rosemary - you know I luvs ya :) )
Comments are now closed for this post.
SallyintNorth
Thursday 19 June, 2014 at 5:18pm
Well, everyone tells me that the Halifax Mill is the best when it comes to small quantities.
So how's about getting a quote for turning your clip into:
rovings or tops (which spinners would buy)
yarn (which knitters would buy)
Come back and tell us what they would charge, and how much rovings or tops they would expect you to get per kilo of fleece (ballpark, of course), and we'll tell you if we think it'd be worth it.
Of course, selling rovings or tops by the 100g, or balls of wool, is maybe more of a futter than boxing up and sending individual fleeces... So then maybe we'd have to look at whether anyone would buy the whole clip's-worth, or market it for / with you ;)
HTH