Washing Fleece

I have decided to show how I wash my fleece, since a couple of previous tries the wool felted. So this is my way of helping someone who may need help with cleaning there fleece. I will start off that my way does take a while and everyone does do it differently. There is no right or wrong way to do it just the way that best fits you and keeps the wool from felting.

The first think you need to do is skirt the fleece, which means to remove any vegetable matter and dung tags. If there are any second cuts or breakage you want to remove them as well. If you have a dryer you can use that for this step with no heat and on air fluff. If not then you have to do it by hand, I also give the fleece a little shake which helps and you may want to do this out side since it is a dirty job.

This is the first step that I do in washing fleece. I let it soak in cold water with nothing added. Some people say that there is a lot of sweat and silt that only will come out this way. Others say it will come out in the detergent wash. I doo it this way because I feel it gets cleaner and you don't use that much soap since your onlly removeing the lanolin and not the dirt as well. If you feel you don't need to do this step then don't or maybe you have never done this step and should give it a try. While the fleece is in the water cold or hot I never agitate it in any way, all I do is let it soak. This is how I keep it from felting.

Here the fleece is draing from the clear water bath.

Here I have the fleece soaking in hot soapy water. I use hot tap water that is 140 degrees to that I add a tablespoon of Borax and Laundry detergent. I decrease the amount of Borax and detergent each time I change the water. I never agitate the fleece I remove it from the water and let the water drain out, the fleece stays in the water for twenty minutes. This batch of fleece took four baths to get all the lanolin out of it. You keep changing the water till you have soap bubbles left. Then I rinse the fleece in the same manner in clear water and I decrease the temperature of the water to cool the fleece down and the water come out clear. This took about four water changes as well.

This is the nice clean fleece before I placed it in the trays I gently squeezed out the excess water. The goal is to have the fleece to look them same as when you started but clean.

This is the fleece drying to the left is the heat vent not shown. I got these crates a while back from a plant auction you typically see them at Easter time with Tulips and Lily's in them.

This is how I was my fleece if there is any thing that can help you out use it. If you see any improvements let me know. But all in all just have fun with it.