Fibre to Fabric
Wool
- The source of wool is animals like sheep, goat, yak which have hair on their bodies.
- These hairs keep the body of these animals warm.
- Sheep hair is called fleece.
- Fleece is made up of coarse beard hair, and fine soft under-hair close to the skin.
- The soft under hair is used to make wool.
- Selective breeding: This is a process of selecting parents so that the offspring can inherit selected set of special characters.
Animals which are a source of wool:
| Animals | Breed | Quality of fibric | States where it is found |
| Sheep | Lohi | Good quality wool | Rajasthan, Punjab |
| Rampur bushair | Brown fleece | Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh | |
| Nali | Carpet wool | Rajasthan, Haryana, Punjab | |
| Bakharwal | For making woolen shawls | Jammu and Kashmir | |
| Marwari | Coarse wool | Gujarat | |
| Patanwadi | For hosiery | Gujarat | |
| Yak | Tibet and Ladakh | ||
| Goats | Angora Goats | Soft and can be woven into Pashmina shawls | Jammu and Kashmir |
| Camels | Llama and Alpaca | South America |
Processing of Fibres into Wool
Fiber to wool:
- Sheep are reared for their fleece. After cutting the hair, the wool is processed into wool
- Rearing and breeding of sheep:
- Sheep’s feed mainly on grassand leaves in fields, lawns etc. is known as grazing.
- Breeders and rearers alsouse a mixture ofpulses, corn, jowar, oil cakes andminerals.
- In winter season sheep are fed on leaves, grain and dryfodder.
- After the growth of thick hair, the hair is shaved off for getting wool and processed further.
Silk
- Silk is obtained from silkworms.
- Rearing of silkworms for obtaining silk is called sericulture
- The different varieties of silk are tassar silk, mooga silk, kosa silk etc.
- Natural silk is obtained from the cocoon of silkworms and is made of protein. Artificial silk, also known as rayon, is obtained from wood pulp and is made using modified plant material cellulose.
Life history of silk moth:
- There are different stages in the life cycle of a silk worm.
- Eggs: the female moth lays eggs on mulberry leaves.
- Larvae: the young caterpillar’s which hatch out of the eggs are called as larvae.
- Pupa: In this stage of life the larvae grow in size. In the initial stage, the pupa starts to weave the 1st fibers of the cocoon and spins the net from side to side.
- The larvae secrete fibers by moving its head. The silkworm fiber is composed of protein which hardens when it comes in contact with air which is then called the silk fiber.
- Once the cocoon is spun completely around the larvae it is called the pupa.
- Silk threads are obtained from the cocoon and then are processed into silk cloth
- Silk fiber has good tensile strength, it is soft to touch.
Types of silks:
- Different types of silk fibers can be distinguished on the basis of their texture like coarse, smooth, shiny, etc.
- Moths of different types can be used to prepare different silk threads like tassarsilk, mulberry silk, erisilk, moogasilk, kosasilk, etc.
- Mulberry silk moth is very common and produces silk which is soft, lustrous, elastic and can be dyed easily.
Journey from cocoon to silk threads:
- Culturing silkworms:
- The female moth lays large number of eggs.
- These eggs are stored on paper or cloth until they are sold to silkworm farmers.
- The farmers store the egg in optimum temperature and humidity.
- the eggs are kept at a suitable temperature to help them hatch at the time when the mulberry trees have fresh leaves.
- The larvae feed on these leaves and increase in size to a very large extent.
- The caterpillars are kept on bamboo trays for 25 to 30 days where they feed on mulberry leaves.
- After this period the larvae starts spinning the cocoon around itself
- Processing silk:
3. Rearing of Silkmoth
