We've started a little commercial venture, not intentionally, but I guess it add's another dimension to Down Wattle Lane.
It all started out with our Arapawa sheep.
I have a wool sack full of Arapawa fleeces, and the idea initially was to clean the wool, spin it, then knit and or weave it into snuggle rugs. Something to snuggle into while relaxing reading a book or watching tv at night.
After a little research it was going to cost a small fortune to wash/scour the fleeces, and to card them ready to spin into yarn.
So my overactive DIY gene, got started researching as to how to scour your own fleece at home.
From my research, to get the dirt, grease, and lanolin out of the fleece, you need to soak the fleece at 70 degrees plus in hot water, with a good amount of dish detergent, followed by some rinses and then drying. After my first couple of attempts, I felt the wool still smelled a little "sheepy" and the wool became rather course.
So that had me asking myself, surely their is a scouring detergent that has been designed for the very purpose of cleaning raw wool fibre.
The answer is YES! There is, Unicorn Fibre Power Scour, made in the USA. After some further research, and youtubing, and I just had to have some!
Although the cost of importing it from the USA was going to cost me around $50 for a small 100ml bottle, so to get around that, I ordered a small shipment, for myself and to share with others, which brought the cost down to about $15 a bottle.
So how is it? It's great! The Power Scour is very effective, you can wash at a lower water temperature - 60 degrees, you only use about a table spoon of Power Scour Detergent per fleece, you actually use less water, the wool comes our cleaner, brighter, softer and it smells better. So I'm convinced, but I would love to hear what other people think.
