Spinning Journal – Log Nº3
Suri Alpaca

Log Nº 3 and after going dark with Neptus, we are going to the complete opposite. Pearly white !!

Back to Alpacas El Camino in Cantabria, and back to my friend Arsenio, who I bought this from directly. This time the fibre comes from one single alpaca: Boreas. And Boreas is not just any alpaca. He is a Suri.

Most alpacas you see are Huacaya, the fluffy, teddy bear looking ones, with a dense, crimpy fleece that grows straight out from the body. Neptus, from Log Nº 2, has that kind of fibre. Suri is the other, much rarer breed. Instead of fluff, their fleece grows in long, silky locks that hang down from the body, almost like little dreadlocks. Less crimp, more shine, a lot more drape. To put it in perspective, more than 90% of the alpacas in the world are Huacaya, so Suri is quite a rare find.

And you can see it straight away. The fibre is a lustrous, pearly white, very smooth, and it came as a combed top, ready to spin, with a little handwritten tag from Arsenio: Boreas, listo para hilar, 100 gr, 100% Suri.

Spinning time

I had 100 grams and I spun all of it on my Ashford Kiwi. Two singles, both S twist, then plied together Z into a 2-ply. Same structure as Neptus. The reason I go for Z ply is because I crochet. With an S ply yarn (the majority of yarns you buy are S plied), I noticed that my yarn will untwist a little bit. That’s normal with the movement of crochet I guess, but they don’t with a Z plied yarn.

I will say that spinning 100% Suri, I noticed it needs a little extra twist compared to merino or other sheep’s wools. It also needs a little less tension. At first it would slip away from my hands, and that is a clear sign to reduce the tension on the bobbin. With that taken into account, I could spin it very fine, but I wanted something on the medium / thicker side. I tried spinning very fine and it’s very doable with the Suri alpaca.

The result: 130 metres of yarn. Soft, zero bounce but a lot of drape. It feels warm in the hands and airy at the same time. And it is very strong. You really need to use force to snap it.

In total it took me around 4 hours to make.

Neptus and Boreas, black and white, both from El Camino, both 100% alpaca, and yet two completely different yarns. That is exactly why I love this. Every fibber I’ve been trying is different , it behaves different.

Carrito de compra
Scroll al inicio