Breed Sampler - Lincoln - Status: Threatened

 

Photo Credit

The Lincoln is one of the four English longwool breeds: Cotswold, Leicester Longwool, Lincoln and Wensleydale. The Lincoln has had a globally significant genetic impact on sheep breeding but today, like most other longwool breeds, the Lincoln is globally rare and facing an uncertain future.  The Lincoln became globally rare during the 1900's.  By 1980 there were fewer than 1,000 purebred Lincoln ewes remaining in Britain.  Since then, numbers in the breed have increased due to a revival of interest in the breed's wool.

The wool can grow between 8 and 15 inches per year, which means that Lincolns are often sheared twice a year to keep the staple a manageable 5 inches or so for spinning. With a micron count between 36 - 40, Lincoln wool is a heavier wool that tends to be best suited for outerwear, rugs and pillows.

It is very long, sleek, shiny and has very low crimp. The long staple made it very easy to spin and the high micron count makes it great for a tough, hard wearing sweater.

  I saw a video about the advantages of the 'thwacking' method of finishing your handspun yarn.  The flaw in her video was that she washed one skein, thwacked it and hung it to dry but she didn't even wash the other skein. A very unfair comparison in my view.  So, I did a little experiment with these two mini skeins.  I soaked them both in the same tub of very warm water for about 30 minutes and pressed the water out of both but rolling them in a towel. I thwacked the one on the left and hung it to dry. The one on the right I simply gave a quick snap between my hands and hung it to dry.

The one on the left does look a bit loftier, fuller to me. Lincoln is a very tough fiber.  I may get different results from one of the finer breed samples.  I will repeat this test with some of the softer samples I have and see what they look like and report back to you. 

Like all the other swatches, this sample was knit on size 6 needles. I don't know what happened in the middle there.