Raw Fleece Processing Optional Step After Washing: Dyeing
Pink and grey Corriedale shades dyed in the lock, then hand combed into top.
After processing a few raw fleeces, white gets pretty boring. Once the lanolin is washed out of the wool, dye will adhere well and can be applied at any time, whether in lock form, roving, or onto spun yarn.
Dyeing the locks pre-combing/carding can be done for a number of reasons:
White can get boooooring…especially if you process a few fleeces a year. Combing/carding a few pounds of white wool followed by spinning kilometres of white yarn can take a lot of the fun out of the whole activity, and make things feel like a chore.
A full fleece gives a lot of wool volume to practice dyeing on. This year, I dyed up an entire Corriedale fleece. I made 17 different colours in 100 - 200 g batches, and learned quite a bit about how depth of shade (DOS) can affect the final colour. I now have 17 new colour recipes in my files that I can use in future projects.
All of the colours dyed using a Corriedale fleece for dyeing practice. I keep recipe cards showing a small yarn sample with the amount of dyes used.
If you dye a colour you aren’t happy with, it’s easy to comb/card fibres together during the next prep stage to get to a colour you like. Earlier this year, with a Romney fleece, I tried to dye a mint green. It turned out lime green and was horrible. But, I blended it with some navy and got a spectacular teal I named “Stormy Seas”. Blended fibres often have more depth than if you just dyed to the colour instead of mixing two differently coloured fibres, which can make yarns more interesting.
“Stormy Seas” Romney 3 ply yarn. Made by combining a lime green with navy through combing.
Dyeing in the lock is simple, throw the wool, dye, and acid into a pot with lots of water, get it good and hot for at least an hour, and it’s done! Dyes should always exhaust at the end of the dyeing time, so the water can be re-used for several batches. The golden yellow below shows what the locks look like straight out of the dye pot.
Golden yellow Corriedale locks, still wet, immediately following dyeing.
You may want to consider dyeing later on (when you have a more processed form of fibre like roving or yarn) if:
A specific pattern of colours is desired. For example, if you want a gradient and do not want to blend fibres by combing/carding, or want very precise colour placement, you should wait to dye.
You want a speckled yarn. You can dye a base colour in the lock, but the speckles would be applied after the yarn is spun, which means dyeing twice.
Whether you choose to dye the washed locks or not, the next step in processing a fleece can be very tedious!