There might not be anything better than turning a really dirty fleece into a white fluffy cloud of fiber. It never crossed my mind when I became interested in spinning that I’d actually purchase raw fleece. That is until I met Maggie Casey. I learned to spin from her in her shop in Boulder and she loves using fleece so she teaches her students to use fleece as a fiber source. Of course I still learned to spin using roving and top and whatever other commercially prepared fiber is available, but getting your hands into actual fleece sure taught me a lot about the material I weave my tapestries with: wool.
It only takes one time of seeing that pile of often grubby, sticky fiber turn into a fluffy cloud of curls and crimp to get you hooked. Apparently Maggie knew this when she brought fleece to her spinning classes at Shuttles, Spindles, and Skeins.
Fleeces in this part of Colorado are often coated. That means that the sheep actually wear coats to protect the fleece from all the hay and other vegetable matter that gets into it when they’re living on farms and not wandering high in the mountains all summer. This is a huge amount of work for the farmer because as the fleece grows the coats have to be upsized. The sheep rip the coats so they have to be repaired and if you don’t increase the coat size, the fleece will felt under it. I think you’d only coat a sheep that was growing a nice spinning fleece! I’m happy there are farmers here who will go to all that trouble.
I’ve purchased a few partial fleeces and one complete fleece recently and it is time to get them cleaned up. I have to wash some of it so I can dye it for my SOAR classes. But while I was digging around in the storage hole fleece basement, I found some partial fleeces that had been there quite awhile. I know because the shepherd moved away from the area during COVID and I purchased these on her farm. It is time to wash some fleece!
I haven’t been spinning from fleece I’ve prepped long enough to have all the experience my teachers have. Maggie Casey and Jillian Moreno have been invaluable references along with blog posts from Sarah Swett and Deb Robson. These four spinning gurus have helped me immeasurably though I promise not to blame them if I ruin a fleece. Maggie says the sheep are growing more right now, so I won’t worry too much about any that I destroy beyond redemption.
I’m testing these two scours, Power Scour and Kookaburra Scour. I’ve already extensively tested Dawn dish soap!
Here is my plan and I’m partway through realizing it.
Test a couple different washing methods. I’ve been using the Dawn method for years but Jillian’s Patreon convinced me to try something different. She has been testing washing methods and her work definitely saved me a lot of errors! I already had both Power Scour and Kookaburra Scour so I wanted to try both of these.
First up? Kookaburra. Sarah Swett’s method uses this wash and I had a very old container of it on my shelf. It worked just fine but the no-rinse aspect of it was kind of difficult for me to accept. I forced myself not to rinse.
Second? Power Scour. Jillian and Deb Robson both recommend this scouring agent and I had just bought a bottle from Clemes and Clemes who also recommend it.
Testing new ways to manage the fleece. Turkey fryer basket, laundry bags, or a new tool? Reading Deb Robson’s 3-part blog post about scouring fleece, I was excited to find her most excellent innovation for the washing process.* She uses kitty litter sifting trays. You read that right.
My turkey fryer basket with fleece in lingerie bags.
I do not have cats and this tool would never have occurred to me, but I was so excited by the prospect that I took myself off to PetSmart to find my own set. I’ve used a similar contraption for years—a turkey fryer basket and the pot it goes with, but the holes in the fryer basket are too big if the fleece isn’t in laundry bags so I had to line it with needlepoint canvas and the whole thing is a bit janky. PetSmart it was!
To my immense disappointment they had zero kitty litter sifting trays. They had many different systems of managing cat poop, but none of them were as simple as this tray with holes inside a solid tray.
A quick search of other pet stores in town yielded nothing. Apparently cat owners in Fort Collins want more complicated poop-management systems. I ordered my new trays online. They arrived a few days later.
Kitty litter sifting trays empty and waiting in my bathtub.
Kitty litter sifting trays being used for scouring fleece. Top tray is full of fleece and water, bottom tray is still dry.
WHITE!
I am always impressed when this happens.
A fine white fleece from Sheep Feather’s Farm: BFL/Teeswater crossed with CVM/Wensleydale. Unwashed on the left, washed on the right. I used Power Scour for that fleece.
Sheep Feather’s Farm coats their sheep and this fleece is shockingly white. I tend to buy fleeces because I like the structure of the fiber and not so much for the color. I don’t think I’ve ever purchased a fleece that was as white as this one after washing. What fun! The fiber is too fine for what we’re doing in my Spin Off Autumn Retreat (SOAR) classes, so this one is for me! I think it will be a wonderful knitting yarn.
Washing procedure for Power Scour
Crank up the hot water heater and warn anyone in the house that they could hurt themselves. Leave notes around in case I forget myself. I would not do this if I had kids at home. The water is dangerously hot when it gets over 130 degrees F.
Soak fleece in hot water (about 145 degrees F) for 20 minutes.
Wash with Power Scour 3 times, 20 minutes each round.
Rinse with 20 minute soak.
Washing procedure for Kookaburra Scour
I followed Sarah Swett’s procedure for this for the most part. I used laundry bags for the fleece for this trial.
Soak in hot water, 20 minutes
Wash twice, 20 minutes each, squeezing lightly between
Spin in washer. Note there is no rinsing!
I had a half fleece that I washed half in Kookaburra and half in Power Scour using the above methods. They are both extremely clean but I can smell the Kookaburra and it bothers me a little bit. The smell isn’t bad, it is just a lingering smell which I am sure will fade with some time. I’ll probably rinse the Kookaburra next time I use it.
Canary stain
This was a new one for me. The full fleece I bought from a Colorado farmer has a wide yellow stain through much of the whiter portions of the fiber. The fleece is of mixed colors, some is gray-brown and some is quite white. The photo below was taken after scouring and it doesn’t wash out. I had to do a little research to figure out what it even was. The integrity of the fiber is good. I have spun a little of it so far and it spins up with a nice yellowish white color. I will most likely dye the yarn. I have dyed some of the fleece with this stain and since the fleece is not actually completely white to start with, the different shades caused by colors in the fleece or by the stain all make for an interesting fleece and I think will give the spun yarn interesting color variations.
Yellow staining throughout a large white and brown fleece.
Several years ago I took a class with Clemes and Clemes at Maggie Casey’s shop, Shuttles. I thought I’d just do it for fun and so I had a little more experience with a drum carder. It only took about an hour before I was completely hooked. It was so much fun to make all kinds of batts while I learned about the equipment. A few months later, this carder was mine. I recommend this fantastic carder as well as any class you can get with Roy and Henry Clemes.
Clemes and Clemes drum carder
In the photo I’m carding some of that fleece with the canary stain so I can try spinning it. What a fun machine this is. I have set it up in the garage here so that I can feed it while monitoring the dye pots. This fleece has turned out to be an all-around challenge for me and it remains to be seen whether the final yarn is something I can use for weaving tapestry. So far I think the drum carder was a good choice for processing. No matter what happens, I’ve learned a lot from playing with it and the sheep will provide more fleece whenever I need more.
*Deborah Robson wrote The Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook (affiliate link). This woman knows her fleece.