Save Sheep Wool
“It is important to remind people of how valuable and sustainable wool is as a fibre and as a natural material. Wool is a product that the most brilliant boffin in the most hi-tech laboratory could never create.”
His Majesty King Charles III, quoted when he was His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, Patron Campaign for Wool
It so happens that one of the most valuable, sustainable, versatile, renewable of the resources available in the North Highland, is also one of the most underrated ones.
We will not attempt a comprehensive historical study to unveil all reasons to why sheep wool industry lost its popularity in the Highlands. Among the most probable and crucial ones seem to be:
overwhelming numbers of sheep introduced to the Highlands during the clearances, when looking after and processing the fleeces became infeasible;
introduction of cotton industry for processing cotton coming from India and reprofiling mills and factories to handle this new fibre;
loss of interest to coarser wool from local breeds of sheep in favour to softer fibres.
Why Sheep Wool Is Good For Us
Firstly, because we have it. Lots and lots.
Our local farmers struggle to find use to all the sheep wool that is being clipped every year, and selling fleeces to British Wool Marketing Board (BWMB) has become unprofitable and not even covering costs for shearing.
As a result, this wonderful, renewable, biodegradable and sustainable resource, which is also very local to us and hence has next to zero carbon footprint, often goes to waste.
So why don’t we pay fair price for the fleeces to our hardworking farmers, use our local wool at home and gardens, and create small (or not so small) businesses to use the sheep wool commercially? Sheep wool ideally fits and embodies the concept of circular economy - when resources are local, reused and repurposed, when economy is de-centralized and concentrated in local communities. So that our own community benefits from our resources, not monopolists.
But we will let businessmen concentrate on economic benefits of utilizing local wool, and will focus on sustainable and environmentally-friendly properties of sheep wool.
Wool is a renewable resource.
Every year, sheep will produce new yield of this wonderful material.
Wool is biodegradable.
It breaks down completely, without leaving microparticles, like synthetic fibres, and does not pollute soil or water. Breaking down, it actually fertilizes the soil.
Wool has inherent insulation and temperature regulation system.
Wool’s natural thermo-regulation system means wool adapts to changes in temperature, keeping you cool when required and keeping you warm when it is hot. Wool keeps you warm when it’s cold and wet, even if the wool you are wearing is wet itself (it dries from the inside out and traps warm air to insulate you). It breathes, absorbing moisture when damp and releasing it when dry, which makes it perfect for bedding and insulation material. According to researches, wool flooring may save up to 20% on energy costs. Wool is naturally resistant to fire and remarkably strong.
Uses of Sheep Wool
Raw unprocessed fleece
One does not have to be an expert in scouring, carding or spinning, to find great ways of utilizing sheep wool.
Soil Improvement and Gardening
Raw fleeces, fleeces of not great quality or sheared a few years ago, as well as discarded parts of fleeces after scouring make perfect material for garden mulching and path lining.
Sheep wool has a great potential as a natural breathable material in improving properties of soil. Dug into the soil as pellets or locks of wool, it will normalize soil structure: clay soil will become more permeable, and sandy soil will retain more moisture.
As a mulch on the surface, wool - either raw, in pellets or felted - provides excellent protection from slugs and snails.
It is a great weed suppressant, and can be used to line paths, instead of weeding or trimming them all the time.
Path Building
Sheep wool can be used, as per Old Roman technique, to line paths in boggy and peaty areas, thus creating “floating“ underlay for rock/gravel hard surface.
This method has been revived and has been in use in Ireland and Cumbria.
We were even kindly provided with Road Building Specifications by National Trust Lake District, that we can share upon request.
Moisture Retention
Thanks to great moisture retaining properties of sheep wool, it is a great substrate for plant hanging baskets.
Also, try growing seeds on wool - it has natural slowly released nutrients, is permeable and thus perfect for developing root system. And seedlings can be simply transferred onto the open ground when ready!
Cleaned Carded or Felted Wool
By scouring and washing your fleeces you unlock whole new array of options for using your sheep fleeces.
If you want to learn how to clean your fleeces, we team up with Highland Wool CIC in Ardgay, to enable members of our community to learn their best practices in prepping fleeces, while saving resources and reusing water. You can sign up to take part in their volunteering sessions.
After cleaning, sheep fleeces can be carded or felted, and also treated from moth and other parasites.
Wool, prepared this way, has huge potential and can be used in a multitude of ways.
Thermal Insulation
Sheep wool has outstanding insulating properties. It, in fact, has an inherent insulation and temperature regulation system, and when used as flooring, it saves up to 20% on energy costs.
You can use wool to insulate your walls, floor and roof, garages, kennels etc. Blocks, panels, rolls, gap fillers or simple draught excluders - it works everywhere.
Sheep wall is also used for making insulating jackets for boiler tanks, to prevent loss of heat.
Sound and VOC Absorption
Sheep wool’s fantastic insulation properties aren’t limited to thermal insulation. It is also very effective sound absorber and improves acoustics in indoor spaces.
By reducing reverberation, sheep wool makes rooms less noisy, which is invaluable for persons with ADHD and similar needs, and at the same time, dramatically improves the space for persons wearing hearing aids and/or suffering from various stages of hearing loss.
And this is not all! Wool also captures VOC (volatile organic compounds) and normalizes moisture content in ambient air!
Domestic Uses
Insulating and shock absorbing properties of sheep wool make it great for a lot of domestic uses. For example, felted sheep wool makes excellent placemats, to protect your table from scratches, heat and reduce noise.
Likewise, lining your surfaces with felted wool for ironing will significantly improve the process.
Densely felted wool balls greatly improve efficiency and speed of drying in the tumbler, they just need to be placed in the drum.
Did you know that you don’t have to slaughter the sheep, to get a sheepskin rug? If the fleece was sheared carefully and preserved as one piece, it can be wet felted from the inside only, to look and work exactly like a sheepskin rug! To reinforce such felted “sheepskin”, the bottom side can be lined with coarse fabric.
Pets
Sheep wool can do a good service to the fellow farm or domestic animals.
It is great for saddle flocking and under saddle mats, as well as for hoof pads for horses.
Dogs and cats love using their beds made of wool. Because of wool’s thermal regulation properties, the woolly beds keep pets warm when it is cold and cool when it is hot.
Crafts
While this use of sheep wool is most traditional and well-explored, here we want to mention the uses of unspun and unwoven sheep wool in crafting, which makes them accessible for anyone, without need to turn to mills or buy spinning and weaving equipment.
Cleaned and fluffed wool makes an excellent filler for cushions, soft toys, furniture etc.
Felted, it works as wadding, to add rigidity and shape to crafted items. Think bags, quilts, soft toys etc.
Felted insoles, slippers, welly socks are so easy to wet felt and mend. We delivered a number of Walk2Felt workshops both in Thurso and at Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival 2024 to wet-felt slippers from sheep wool, by just going for a walk! We are very grateful to Garance Warburton, Dunnet Community Forest Development Officer, for leading on these workshops and teaching us this magical skill.
Peg Loom Weaving
While this method requires the wool to be formed into a thread, you can really get away with not having to properly spin the wool for making cute and very cozy rugs.
Peg looms are very easy to make, even easier to use - please get in touch if you would like a training workshop on this technique.
The wool does not need to be dyed to make different patterns - you can simply use natural wool of different shades of white and brown. The warp for this method needs to be coarse and strong, for instance, like twine or thick cotton thread.
In our research around ways of using sheep wool we stumbled across lots of fascinating and informative resources, we hope you might find them useful, too.
https://www.lairglearningcentre.org.uk/
https://www.highlandwool.scot/
https://www.rampishamhillmill.co.uk/
https://www.campaignforwool.org/
https://www.campaignforwool.org/
#highlandcommunitywaste