P Colvin

I'm book marking this thread.  Not sure how I ended up down this rabbit hole again today. Lol. Plant fibers are something I've been farting around with for a few years, but with an eye toward , as mentioned in some of the threads.  I have a lot of work to do, so the fun stuff gets put to the side,.often.  I'm an amateur study of primitive skills and making things, borne out of being. broke as snot my early adult years.  I think different than a lot.of.folks.  I don't like wasting money on Walmart overpriced cotton underwear that gets a hole in the seams after one day, made by exploited people, and I could care less what people think of me.  In fact, I'm the one preaching self sufficiency and frugal as a lifestyle bc we are so slave to the paycheck that is never big enough and takes us away from our kids.  With a Jesus chapter thrown in bc .. Well , that's part of who I am.  Take it or leave it, I won't twist your arm, it's a choice,.not mandatory.  You do you and I'm just livin' my life and trying to do better.

So I'm the weirdo brain that never stops cranking a problem in the back of my brain while doing other tasks, twisting grass together in a field to see if it's useful for clothing, etc.  My goal is to make my own clothing from fiber to.finished.product and ditch cimmercial production altogether.  Even our fabric, which is getting harder to find, is poly blends and/or made in explored countries.  I'm aiming for natural,.also, to.put non-plastic on my body. I know I can't win every battle and there is only one of me. This stuff takes FOR EVER.

So, I've started as a hand spinner probably about 2011, and I have spun a.LOT.of.different things.  Dog, cat, dog/alpaca blends.  Angora bunny and bunny/alpaca mix.  Sheep,.of course.  Recycled yarn combed back out to fluff.  Alpaca.mixed with strips.of.recycled fabric for novelty yarn.  My horses' shedding winter belly hairs, my daughters hair. .  Pillow fluff, cotton balls, cattail fluff, fireweed fluff, dryer lint.

As I've moved on into plant fibers, well that's a bit of a learning curve, and I started in with twisting cordage for basket weaving.  I've found that cordage, even thread-thickness can be made from a LOT of different plants,  with varying strength.  I've used the inner bark of trees, or just the bark for a rough cord (did fun design for baskets) .  Blackberries, it some folks call them brambles were traditionally used to make rope, and they are.invasive here in the PNW,.so I'm looking at those a lot.  Nettles and flax of.course, .as.mentioned.above. Side now- there's a YouTube video (or two) or there about processing nettle with your hands with no retting.  I've done it and it comes out very soft to the skin.  I'm still working on the learning process to make plant fibers good for clothing.  Spinning those fibers is a.learning.curve I haven't mastered yet, but when Christmas is over I intend.to.spend some.time on it during the cold,.rainy darkness that lasts.for six.months here.

I'm working.with cattail leaves a.lot.for.basket weaving bc they are plentiful here and make attractive cordage quickly, Something  I'm considering as I'm creating for the vendor season.  When I cut the cattail, I leave the stalk in the grind and just cut the leaves off and leave a few for it to grow back with, and didn't include the thicker yellow but at the bottom of the leaf bc it gets hard to twist when it's dry, bc it has more water cells in it.  Sidenote, that cattail slime is a medicinal.   While still green,.I do kind of a hackle. process like with flax, and run.each.leaf individually over my wool hand.carders,.to split the leaf into tiny lengths of long fiber. I'll try to spin these.later, bc dry, they are about like a thread thick.  I hang these over a wire to dry it year into hanks like yarn if it's very hot summer weather, as they can mold while drying.  Then for.cordage making, I rewet briefly and twist.into cordage.  It makes very nice, thin thread almost, but it's very tedious work by hand.  I haven't figured out how to spin plant fiber very well and to get it to stick together, even with a drop spindle, even using water.  But for twisting cottage, I have at least adapted a sort of jig I built that can stick into a wall with a peg or mail, or I made it so it fits into the orifice of my spinning wheel.  There's a YouTube video under search terms.fir.medieval.rope maker.  It saves my wrists  little bit, but makes a slightly rougher  single ply row, which must then be plyed back to make the double.  I've got the cordage making thing down pat, but it's kind of tied together with clothing making in the back of my head.  But twisting nicely made.cordage by hand fine enough to weave it knit and get enough if it?  I've seen Sally Pointer and others do that to make little bags or a hat.  Good grief, methinks it would take YEARS and a lot of wrist.pain to get clothing.  I seem to remember reading that peasants were paid yearly with a set of clothing, bc it took that long to.create the set of clothing.

I have read of our indigenous coastal tribes in the PNW using a mix.of.their now extinct "wooly dog" hair, goat hair (highly prized and used for higher ranking people, mixed with cattail fluff and other plant parts (for extra insulation? It doesn't say) to make that big, thick blanket you see.pictured in the old black and white photos of the tribal people. They later used sheep wool, and I have seen spindles that are large, like 3 ft long stick with a bottom whorl (4" wide or sometimes bigger like 8"?) supported like what Navajos do.  With the "yarn" produced looms to be a half inch or so thick?  I would so love to see the display up in Seattle area with the actual items.  Maybe this winter.

As far as what is "good to spin with"?  I'm self taught, do my opinion (and at the end of the day that's what they are, not fact lime so many claim lol ) is that short fibers are a pain in the rear.  It can be done.  I would rather move on to things that make me wanna swear less, but that's just me.  Cotton balls have maybe a half inch staple length....that's the length of the little tuft of fluff you're working with.  It, like the other short lengths, breaks off a lot (dropped spindle on the floor often, and on the spinning wheel?  Hahahahaha!  Ya, no.  Jist, no.). I had.to.twist with my fingers and treat it VERY delicate, bc it is. Very slow going, too. Then, when I get a length, I ply it back on itself, bc it's too fussy to do a chain ply,.falls apart a lot.  That being said....like all things that gain their strength after being plied ...cotton balls become amazingly strong as a two ply yarn.  But.to.get....that two ply cord....Whew!  I came.  I saw.  I went.  That was fun.  NEXT!!!  You do what pain in rear that you are willing to mess with. I did.it bc I found actual.cotton balls a dollar a bag. Three bags netted me a golfball or maybe two sized ball of yarn.  Not even enough for underwear, which was my end goal. Lol  

So...can the short fibers be spun?  Absolutely.  Do they make me want to say bad words and I don't wanna do it anymore and takes even longer than the already labor intensive process of the bast fibers?  Absolutely. Lol

Sorry I wrote a book.  Hope I caught all the typos that happen in my phone.  Creators brain just geeked out there for a minute. Also, coffee was involved. Will see if I.can attach a.photo.of.one.if my primitive baskets to.show the cordage I mentioned. If the.pics.are still on my phone. I hope my wordiness helps someone. I see this thread goes back quite a few years b  And I'm also always still learning every day.

Oh- location for plants here for "PNW" is USA Western Washington State.

*Found it.  One.of the primitive baskets I sell at vendor events.  Cattail leaf cordage, some.if my alpaca, a paper pulp paper.mache button,.and a fun wonky stick picked up on the property.  These are the things I do to maybe someday support my addictions, not the least.of which is a non-rideable, totally wild freeloader.rez mustang and a few sheep n alpacas.  They stand at the back door n yell at me to.feed them 24/7.

Following this one.  I have been playing around with nettle, grass, cattail leaf, juncus, and blackberry vine.   I have some flax.dried that I grew, but that's all the farther I've gotten.  Blackberry  is the most invasive, but also the most passion in the year to get the fibers from.  Plus, blackberry sure it pretty strong, bit not very soft.  Maybe retting the fiber will help. The easiest to mess with was cattail, but I haven't gotten it into fluid stage yet, just tiny strings.  It also didn't want to stay together when spinning.  It makes great cordage for basket weaving, though.  Very nice looking.  I wove some cattail cordage into a watch band, and then had to sew that onto a piece of denim for comfort. After about a year of use, the weave started to unravel.  It was still pretty thick. That was a two ply twist cordage and it started to break at the bending point on the wristband.

My nettle, I found an clip on YT by Sally Pointer where she just stripped the fibers.right after she picked the nettles. No retting. I have a dried bundle of fibers setting that I rub between my hands whenever I walk by it. I haven't  carded it yet.  Do they do that wet, or dry? Seems to me you would waste an awful lot of that precious nettle carding it dry. But the nettle cordage I experimented with is SO soft.  Nettle, no retting.Just scraping.off the green.

I picked regular old grass from my garden and made some cheese after it dried a bit.  I put it on kids toy weaving look and it's holding as a warp so far.  But my hands are killing me from all the skinning and training I've been doing, so I had to stop.

I have precious little of flax or nettle, so I'd sure like to make that blackberry work.  It's taking over my property.

Pic below.of.my grass cordage from.today, the HARDEST way to make string
 Sign....

Regarding the question about daisies, I have the same issue and the same question.  I saw on another video...was it Sally Pointer? They took a plant fresh picked.andushed it all up to see if it separated into fibrous threads to see if it would be good for textiles or cordage. I haven't gotten my daisies.to.do that to an amount.t I want to pursue, anyways. I have woven baskets with them. Nothing fancy, just basket to pick blackberries with.

I found this thread in my search for nettle processing and blackberry vine processing, since I have a few.  It would be great if I could find a way to soften blackberry enough to be wearable. And find a way to give my hands some.relief in making.all.this cordage.  Just spent two or three days nonstop.spinning.wool on a road trip with a drop spindle.and I had to go find my copper bracelets.for some pain relief.  I also put my hands in the nettles.😁.  That actually works,.and yes it hurts. But in arthritis type.pain.it.hurts (hard to explain)....differently....  Short term.... than when it did to me as a kid.

Further up in the thread someone mentioned.big welts on their skin and plantain to relieve it.  I got those as a kid,.and was.taugnt to use.the dots on the underside.of a sword.fern rubbed on it.  Then later on I learned bracken fern works.as well. I don't get those welts anymore.and welcome the two or three days of pain relief.

Below is pictured:

1- Nettle.fiber split when first.picked.and hung.to.dry, rubbed by hand remove the rough bits.  Then on to carding.  Per Sally Pointer.on YouTube.

2 and 3-  Blackberry vine fiber stripped down at picking and then twisted into cordage. It's pretty rough, but rubbing the cordage on the edge of a table seems to soften it a little.

THIS.   is what I've been searching for!  I knew that cattail had potential to be spun!  I have scads of it broken down into material I can make cottage with, but my ultimate goal was to spin it and make clothing.  All I did was split it, dry it, rewet it, and then make cordage.  Then I used it for weaving or basket making.  But I would love to make a nice linen fabric. I'm keeping an eye on this thread so I can learn more.  We have cattail in abundance, but it's a cleaner of water sources.  We also have invasive blackberry bushes everywhere.  The fiber from the blackberries makes great footage and rope, but it's real rough.  Maybe I can find a way to soften it.

Link to my first attempt at weaving something with catrail:  https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP86VV4bd/

I have made a watchband, and plenty of baskets.  Cattail gets brittle.  I even ran the stuff green over my wool carders and shredded it up close to what flax would look like for spinning, but it won't stay together for spinning on a spinning wheel.  It slides apart and won't stay a string.  I guess with flax you use water to help it stay glued together.  

I am learning, but by bit, as I find little nuggets like this hidden away on the Internet, of the  beaten path. So I will try boiling the cattail.  Maybe something like that will work in the fibrous blackberry vines, too.  BlackBerry is a lot more work to harvest, though.

I think technology, on a tightly controlled, very limited basis...can be a good thing.  Our current situation, however, with social media websites, money based flow.of.information, censorship....is a doggone mess.  I'm old enough to remember (like the movie "War Games") where a computer dialed another computer through the phone line, and you played a video game with another person on a DOS OS.  Pong, was my first game.  Remember Juno free email, "e-zines", and "You've Got Mail".  That was my twenties.  I'm turning 50 in a few months, and have gone full circle from building desktops and graphic design, to farming on a small scale.  

That being  said, I'm currently attempting to exploit said technology to make the feed bill.  I see a lot of modern "small homesteads" employing a lot of different income streams and I'm attempting to do so as well.  So I'm attempting to profit from people's narcissistic addiction to technology (I'm guilty, too).  I have a YT channel, Fakebook, Instagram, and TikTok, as well as a home base website that so far doesn't get cancelled if I say the wrong thing.  On those, I post affiliate links along with my articles and videos of how to do self sufficiency skills and so on.

It's really hard to keep our kids away from it,.and it causes social ineptness and social anxiety, inability to connect with other people or look them in the eye.  Electromagnetic energy pulsed into the body   Brain over stimulation from the lignt.
Short attention span and horrible communication skills.  HORRIBLE spelling. In addition to exposing us all to some just really awful material,.and is a doorway for pedos and financial scammers. When my 6 yr old grandson comes to visit,.all gadgets are put away.  His.purpose.for being   here is to experience farm life.  And you know what?  His "ADD" just magically disappears!  And he falls into bed happily exhausted after we read a story from.an actual book with pages,  and doesn't have bad dreams when he's here. At his own house, they put in cartoons for him to go to sleep by. Although we do watch Tom.n Jerry cartoons in bed in the mornings for a bit while I suck down my coffee, attempting to rally the energy to keep up with this child. Lol. Grama needs coffee!

I work very hard to limit my social media time to "work" and during my morning coffee time.  And I work very hard to avoid negativity on it,.politics, arguments, and the like.  I post on forums rarely.  Mostly it's work.  Part of my daily routine.  I compose a video, and/or blog article for both my farm and hub's handyman business, share to all my social medias and then get OFF the phone.   And go outside to do things with the animals.  Movement is what my fat body needs, not setting on my butt in front of a screen getting hungry and angry.from.commercials.and.negative posts.

I'm seeing mostly plant growing on these forums...a few chickens.  Is the idea.of permaculture.a non-animal setup? Just curious.  And I'm thinking back to historically the millions of.bison.in the U.S. continent and the Natives using controlled.burns to "herd" them.  Just.my brain rolling thoughts around.

As a small acreage (13 acres).setup with a couple horses, a couple pigs and good grief, will the predators STOP picking off my chickens!!!  I'm looking at pet insurance.  Here in the States we have a thing called Care Credit that my vet accepted that I'm NOT happy with.  Loan sharks.  Between the cats getting initial checkup, shots, and fixed, dog jumped out a second story window, and horse checkups and one emergency visit for choke/pneumonia ...I used the $2,000 limit pretty darn quick, and the interest rate is abysmal, with a $45 late fee. There's.lots.of.issues with these guys, so I started looking around.

https://www.tbo5trk.com/MF3W3H/2GMH37/       #ad

So far I've checked out the first one on the list.and.it seems to be for cats and dogs.only, but they give you $20k a year to work with and pay out 90%?

I'm still looking through the others, bc I have more than did and cats.  Thoughts? Ideas?

I found a book on the subject at Barnes and Noble.  

https://mavely.app.link/e/A85pVEdFUxb

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