I came across this Jacobs tup at the Trim Hay Making Festival in County Meath in 2019. I was there with the Donkey Breed Society (NI) to demonstrate making hay with our donkeys.

Having admired his sweeping horns, all four of them, I was offered his fleece. He was to be clipped that afternoon, so once the hay was cut and raked up into stooks I went back down the field and claimed my fleece.

The process of turning this fleece into yarn starts with skirting which is the process of removing vegetable matter and matted parts of the wool. Then, several cold rinses later, with a year’s worth of sweat and dust removed, the fleece needs carding. The drum carder does two jobs, aligns the long fibres whilst removing short fibres and any remaining vegetable matter. I like to do this outside if possible as a lot of dust falls through to the bottom of the carder.

I had sorted the black from the white wool in order to control how they combine when spinning. Drum carding the two together would result in a grey blend which is lovely but not what I was looking for this time.

I used hand cards to create rolags that were a mix of black and white. This resulted in a single ply that alternated black with white. I have many different spinning wheels which all have their own characters but for production spinning the Ashford Joy with double treadles is the machine of choice. Once the singles are plied together, the yarn becomes a mixture of black, white and a glorious humbug.

A recent addition to my collection of antiquated equipment is a brass and mahogany ball winder...the sound of it is a wonderful clanky rumble. The resulting balls remind me of a jar of black and white mints.