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inally, the day you have been waiting for has
come! Your wonderful alpaca fiber is packed and
ready to be shipped to a mill for processing. After
all the work and energy of shearing, cleaning,
skirting, and storing fiber, finally you are ready to
move to the next step. You can’t wait to get the
finished products back. You are as excited as a kid
at Christmas. It would be absolutely wonderful,
if only that little voice in the back of your mind
would stop asking if you really know what you
are doing.
Don’t worry – you are not alone. Practically
every breeder who has ever sent her prize fleeces
off to be processed has had the same doubts. Will
the processor understand how to work with alpaca
fiber? Is the mill careful not to waste any of the
fiber? Will the quality of the finished products
meet your standards? Can you sell the products
for enough to cover the cost of processing?
If you have never worked with a mill, or even if
you have, there are steps you should take before
you commit a single ounce of fiber – steps that will
help to ensure the experience is a positive one for
both you and the mill staff. It should come as no
surprise that communication is a big part of any
successful fiber processing venture, and that you
must be able to clearly communicate your needs
and desires in order to gain the best outcome.
To communicate effectively with the mill, you
will need to do some work ahead of time. Don’t
even think about talking to fiber processors until
you know the following:
1. How much cleaned and skirted fiber
do you have?
Many mills have minimum amounts of fiber that
they will process. Knowing how much fiber you
have, in pounds (or kilos, if processing your
fleeces in Canada), allows you to eliminate from
your list of possible processors those mills that
require more fiber than you have available. Mini-
mills, which are smaller operations, may be willing
to process as little as a pound of fleece but most
commercial mills will require more, perhaps as
much as 50 to 100 pounds for some products.
2. What quality fiber do you have?
To get the best quality products, you should try
to group your raw fiber by staple length and fine-
ness. Mixing shorter and longer staples or mixing
fine fleeces with coarser ones causes uneven spin-
ning and can create unattractively lumpy yarn. It
can also affect the long term wear of your finished
products, because fibers that are too different in
length or fineness do not stay in the spin as well
and will begin to migrate out. I once saw a quilt
that was “growing hairs.” The coarse guard hair
in the quilt batting migrated out of the felting
and pierced through the quilt cover. We called it
the “werewolf quilt,” and it was not a result you
would want to repeat!
Once you have grouped your fleeces by fineness,
staple length, and other qualities such as color, go
back to the first question and determine how much
you have by weight of each category of fiber.
3. What products do you want to make
from your fiber?
In large part, the type of finished products is
determined by the quality of fiber that you have.
For example, the finest fleeces are suitable for
making garments that will be worn next to the
skin but very fine fiber may not hold up to heavy
duty wear. Outerwear can be created from medi-
Taking Care of Bus iness
by Deb Hi l l
Our warm and fuzzy critters – they are why most breeders get into the business. But, it is a business, and this regular column
will give you practical suggestions on how to maximize that business.
F
36
Alpacas
Magazine
Good Communications: Key to Best
Fiber Processing Results