Fiber Artist Problems
So if you get into historic clothing, and\or Fancy-Ass Yarn, you run into something that runs like this:
"(really fancy-ass technique) involved hand-plucking wool from the sheep, usually from the neck..."
However, this kind of sounds painful for the sheep.
And in case anyone's wondering, this is a sheep:
So if you, say, aren't PETA, here's the logical question:
How the fuck is the human doing this not getting attacked by a furious lump of angry animal with hooves, horns, and no fucks given?
Well, turns out that The Great God Wikipedia actually had...kind of an answer.
I cannot even begin to tell you why, but this article on sheep shearing is almost completely Australia-focused, despite the fact that sheep shearing--you know, how you get wool OFF the sheep? Required to prevent sheep overheating? Haircuts 4 Sheeps, and they are THRILLED to do it with a razor like humans are also thrilled when their hair is annoying them?--is global.
But it DID have a fun line that runs thus:
In some primitive sheep (for example in many Shetlands), there is a natural break in the growth of the wool in spring. By late spring this causes the fleece to begin to peel away from the body, and it may then be plucked by hand without cutting – this is known as rooing. Individual sheep may reach this stage at slightly different times.
"Hand-plucked". Aha.
And a Google search presented this article. Which says:
Rooing your Shetland sheep! Your pure bred Shetland sheep loses it’s fleece naturally! This means you don’t need to shear or clip it off like you do with other sheep. You can simply pluck it off the sheep – it’s a bit like pulling hair out of a hairbrush! Sometimes the sheep might feel a tug, like we do when we get our hair brushed, but pulling the wool off doesn’t hurt the sheep.
(I took out the colors. You're welcome.)
So, if anyone's looked at the sentence ""(really fancy-ass technique) involved hand-plucking wool from the sheep, usually from the neck..." and wondered "what, and the sheep didn't fucking murder them?"...well, turns out: The wool naturally breaks.
The sheep is, as always, just getting a haircut. And I imagine the haircut also involves Hooman Pettings, which most domestic animals consider A++ Good Times.
This concludes today's episode of Research That Absolutely In No Way Needed Doing, And Yet I Have Done It Anyway.
