Fiber Processing

Hints and suggestions on spinning suri fleece. more »

Since about 2008, the Australian alpaca fleece market has moved from a single desk marketing system dominated by the Australian Alpaca Fleece Ltd, to competitive supply networks incorporating a number of fleece collection and buying entities. The entities range from producer based collectives to commercial businesses. Further, these entities are able to adopt any one, or a combination of fleece collection protocols or standards that have been developed over recent years to provide guidance on how to class alpaca fleeces into commercially driven consignment lines. more »

As soon as an alpaca – suri or huacaya - is restrained on the shearing table or floor, its fleece becomes a commercial commodity. The genetics, breeding, awards and animal’s name and temperament are no longer important. The priority at that point is to obtain the highest commercial yield possible from individual and groups of alpacas with the key being ‘consistency’. That means aiming to have consistency within a single skirted fleece and within the total fleece clip of your alpaca herd. more »