{"id":4694,"date":"2020-05-30T08:21:26","date_gmt":"2020-05-30T06:21:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/waltin.se\/josefinwaltinspinner\/?p=4694"},"modified":"2021-03-01T18:58:27","modified_gmt":"2021-03-01T17:58:27","slug":"finull-wool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/waltin.se\/josefinwaltinspinner\/finull-wool\/","title":{"rendered":"Finull wool"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The first wool I ever dug my hands into was the fleece of Pia-Lotta the finull<\/strong> sheep (Swedish finewool). Finull wool is my home wool, the wool I feel I know the the best. Finull sheep is one of only three wool breeds in Sweden \u2013 breeds where wool is an important part of the breed standards. In this sixth part of my breed study of Swedish sheep breeds from the spinner’s perspective I will share my experience with finull wool. Previous posts have been about Gotland wool<\/a>, Gute wool<\/a>, Dalap\u00e4ls wool<\/a>, V\u00e4rmland wool<\/a> and J\u00e4mtland wool<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This Sunday, June 7th at 5 pm CET<\/strong> I will host a free<\/strong> live breed study webinar on Swedish finull wool!<\/strong> I will share my experiences with the wool from a spinner’s perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Wool
Wool staples from the finull sheep Karin from Glada f\u00e5ret <\/a>sheep farm.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

About finull sheep<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Finull sheep is the first sheep I got to know as a spinner. To me, it is the way a sheep looks, the mother of sheep if you will. I’m sure you have a “home” breed too that you measure all other sheep against. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finull sheep stem from the Swedish landrace that has grazed Swedish pastures for centuries. It didn’t become it’s own defined breed until the 1980’s. Therefore it shares the common history of the Swedish landraces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Finull
Sweet finull lambs in a small-scale shepherding course I took in 2014.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A bit of Swedish sheep history<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The landraces<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The Swedish landraces were the only sheep in Sweden until the early 16th century. They most probably originate from the North European short-tailed sheep. They had different kinds of wool with both soft undercoat and coarser outercoat and provided Swedish farmers with carpets, vadmal and coarser textiles. Finer textiles couldn’t be produced with wool from the Swedish landraces. King Gustav Vasa ordered import of “bum sheep (rumpef\u00e5r) which would mean the fat-tailed sheep from Germany, Great Britain and later Spain, with finer wool. For 300 years Sweden imported these breeds to varying degrees of success. The aim was to exterminate the “harmful Swedish sheep”, but the attempts failed. The farmers needed the coarse wool for the necessary textiles they had always produced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Decrease, more decrease and increase<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

During the industrial revolution sheep farming decreased \u2013 Sweden imported cheap wool and especially cotton to the spinning mills. Many of the imported breeds and their crosses were removed and replaced with cows. During the First World War the demand for wool from the Swedish landraces increased again. The mills in Sweden couldn’t produce the same kind of lustrous textiles that were found in the museum collections. Breeding was then aimed at saving the old landrace and isolated flocks of Swedish landraces were found in remote areas of Sweden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of these refound flocks had fine wool with lots of shine. They may be a result of crossing the landrace sheep with imported Spanish Merino sheep in the 18th century. The finer wool was also found in Finland (which at the time was part of Sweden). Thetra sheep with finer wool were crossed, first and foremost with Finnish landrace sheep, the first time in 1938. During the Second World War the demand for meat breeds increased and the pure-bred landraces decreased again. In the 1970’s the interest in Swedish landraces increased again and the Swedish finull sheep association was founded in the 1980’s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Finull
Finull sheep. Photo by Dan Waltin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Finull sheep today<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Swedish finull sheep are fertile and usually get between 2 and 5 lambs. They are quite friendly and calm. The ewes weigh 50\u201370 kg and the rams 80\u2013100 kg. The statistics from 2019 say 2115 breeding ewes in 161 flocks, but there are lots of finull flocks outside of the sheep breeder\u2019s association too. A lot of finull sheep are also crossed with other breeds \u2013 Gotland sheep, texel sheep, rya sheep, Dorset sheep (Findor) and East Frisean milk sheep are common.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finull sheep are white (61 %), black (23 %) and brown (17 %). The brown sheep have a higher resemblance to the Finnish landrace with a bigger variety in wool fibers, coarser wool and wool on the top of the head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wool characteristics<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Finull sheep is one of the three Swedish wool breeds \u2013 breeds where wool is an important part of the breed standards. The other two are J\u00e4mtland sheep<\/a> and Rya sheep (coming up soon). It is also one of the breeds that has a part in the new breed J\u00e4mtland sheep<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The
A shepherd apprentice and I go through finull lambs and look for the best fleeces. Photo by Dan Waltin.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Finull wool is soft, fine and shiny with a high crimp. The difference between undercoat and outercoat is very small. Swedish finull is popular among both hand spinners and Swedish spinning mills. The mills use finull for soft finull yarn but also to mix with Gotland wool<\/a> since Gotland wool is too slippery to go through the carding machines unmixed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Finull wool. Photo by Dan Waltin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Since finull is a wool breed there are standards and statistics for the wool. The staples are around 5\u20139 cm (when shorn twice a year) with an average crimp count of 8 crimps per 3 cm. The shine is around 4 of a scale of 1\u20135. The standards for the breed encourage breeding for shine, staple and crimp evenness. The micron count should be 20\u201330 microns and the wool should be even across the body of the sheep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most finull sheep are shorn twice a year. I have seen one or two whole-year finull fleeces, but that is an exception. A whole-year fleece will most probably break or felt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Me
Me shearing the finull sheep Pia-Lotta, whose lamb’s fleece was my very first wool.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

At a course in small-scale shepherding I took back in 2014 I got to shear Pia-Lotta the finull sheep, the sheep whose lamb’s wool was that first wool I spun. You can see more of the wool from this shearing in one of my earliest videos Slow Fashion \u2013 from sheep to sweater<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Main characteristics<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The main characteristics, the superpowers, of finull wool that I want to enhance in a yarn are the shine<\/strong>, softness<\/strong> and crimp<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n