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Nettle fiber (part 2)

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Thaïs the Weaver

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My nettle fiber experiment continues! You can read Part 1 here. After the initial peeling and rubbing of the outer layers, I still needed to remove some flakes of the outer skin and separate the fibers more consistently. I tried a few different things, but here is the method that worked well for me (without having to buy any new tools).

I attempted to make something like a flax hackle, but the materials I had on hand weren’t up to the task. The nettle fibers are finer and more delicate than flax fibers, so I had to experiment to find something that wouldn’t simply shred them into cottony down. Some people just card their nettle fiber, but that would have trapped a lot of the skin flakes inside the rolls of fluff. Besides, I had bundles of lovely, long fibers that I wanted to preserve if possible.

I tried combing out the long hanks of fiber with a few different hair combs. The one that worked best is a carved wooden comb that I used to use for my hair but has recently been living in my drawer of weaving supplies (since I started playing around with tapestry). Starting at one end, I combed out the nettle fiber just like I would comb long hair, up to the center point of the hank. Then I switched to the other end and did the same. This resulted in a hank of much cleaner, long line fibers and a mixed pile of fuzzy combed-out fibers.

A hank of fiber is spread out over a background split between brown paper and white cloth. The part of the hank over the brown paper is combed out, straighter and lighter in color. The part of the hank over the white cloth is not yet combed, and it is darker in color with more chaotic fibers. The white cloth is littered with many small dark flakes from the skin of the stalks.
Combing the nettle hank it over the white cloth helps catch the skin flakes that drop off.
A fully combed white hank of straight, organized, long fibers is curled into a loop on the left, while a disorganized and chaotic pile of white fibers sits on the right.
Fully combed hank on left; fibers that came out on the comb on right.

This combed hank is the longest group of fibers from this year’s nettle harvest, the ones long enough they had to be looped in the photo.

A zoomed view of the long fibers arranged on the white cloth.
The longest batch of nettle fibers, only combed with the wooden comb
The long fiber has a color and shine similar to straw after being combed.
Longest fiber hank detail photo
The individual nettle fibers are very fine, so the combing separates the bast into ribbons of various sizes. I wanted to get them as small as feasible without losing more than half the volume of the fibers to the comb.
Close-up view of combed fiber from the longest hank

The fibers that came out on the wooden comb were a mix of some strong, medium-length fibers and short fuzz. Again, not having a hackle, I pondered how to separate these two groups most effectively. I do have a pair of double-row wool combs that are used to perform a similar function with wool, so I loaded them up with the fluff pile and tried combing it like fleece.

A pair of wool combs with a jumble of the shorter fibers from the previous combing loaded onto the tines of one wool comb.
Closer view of the loaded wool comb showing fibers that are a bit finer than the long hank but not well organized.

This worked surprisingly well! I was able to straighten out the long fibers and then pull them the rest of the way off the combs while leaving the shorter fibers behind, quite similar to combing Icelandic wool fleece. Using the wool combs, I was able to make a bundle of medium-length fibers that could still be spun as line fiber rather than carded as tow.

The medium length fibers arranged in a straight bundle after being separated and pulled out of the mess on the wool combs.
The bundle of medium-length nettle fibers separated from the shorter fluff with wool combs
A ball of the short, fluffy mess left over after pulling the medium length fibers out using the wool combs.

The pile of short-length fluff (tow) separated from the medium-length fibers with wool combs

For scale, here is a 1-foot (30.5 cm) ruler with all 3 fiber bundles and the combs used. Many of the medium fibers are still more than a foot long!

Another view of the first photo with a ruler added for scale. The ball of short tow fibers is roughly 7 inches in diameter. The medium fiber bundle is approximately 18 inches long, and the long bundle is a little more than 2 feet in length.

My next step will be making a simple distaff so I can attempt to spin the long fibers in a somewhat manageable way. It will be interesting to compare it against flax!

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