We have been asked many times why our yarns are so soft and bouncy. I think we get this question because many knitters and spinners are accustomed to Shetland wool that is scratchy.
There are actually several reasons why our Shetland wool is so soft.
First, we have spent years acquiring, breeding, and
retaining some of the finest Shetlands you are going to find here in North
America. We micron test our sheep every year and we know which fleeces are the
finest. The fineness of the fleece is a big component of how soft the yarn feels. The handle of the fleece is heavily influenced by fineness also, but how
a fleece feels is impacted by other factors and we breed for all of them. We
don’t just throw sheep together in breeding groups and hope for the best. There
is a definite strategy and focus on fleeces that have the potential to produce soft and bouncy wool for knitting and spinning.
I am not the most knowledgeable Shetland breeder in
North America, but I have been trained by Shetland Sheep Society Inspectors,
and have a really solid understanding about what the breed can and should be in
Great Britain. Knowing a good fleece is an important part of what we do. We
only retain what I consider to be the very best.
Another factor here is the consistency of the fleece. Anyone
can take a fiber sample, perform micron testing, and declare that their sheep
is fine, but how fine is the fleece from front-to-back? Is there a lot of guard
hair? Does the fineness fall off drastically in the back of the sheep? If you
make yarn out of a fleece that is a melting pot of fine and coarse fibers, the
yarn is not going to feel soft. That’s just a scientific fact. We strive to
minimize the fiber-to-fiber and within fiber variability. That makes a big
difference and contributes to a softer wool product.
The final reason that our yarns feel softer than what fiber
enthusiasts might typically experience elsewhere is that we hand process most
if not all of our fleeces. That means each lock is hand carded and handspun for knitters or handcranked into batts for spinners. There is a huge difference between a fleece that is commercially
processed and an identical one that has been done by hand like they would have
been done in the old days. Technology is wonderful in terms of productivity,
but in the yarn world, you pay a price in quality in order to obtain quantity.
Our goal here is to only sell the best yarns that the Shetland breed can offer.
The only way to do that is to hand process the fleeces.
That’s pretty much it. Our yarns start out with the finest
Shetland wool and then we meticulously hand craft each skein of yarn so that it
is the best that it can be in terms of softness and bounce.
