Systems of Counting......... Fleece that is

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There are a few ways of determining the fineness of a fleece. Many of us have heard the words blood count, S Count and micron. But what does that really mean? We will try and explain it to you -

The American Blood Count System

A long time ago - no one knows for sure when or where, but know it did happen - some shepherds were comparing one flock with another. Of course with the mind-set that their sheep were the best! But how could you compare without a standard? Something that everyone knew - someone in this group suggested that it should be the Merino sheep. Everyone knew the fleece was about 2 1/2 inches long, the fiber was very fine and its crimp was very small and close together. After some discussion, it was agreed upon and that the Merino Sheep Fiber would be the standard for comparison. This fleece would be called "Fine" (mind you it had to do with the fiber diameter, not with quality).

This little group of shepherds decided how to grade a sheep by how much "Merino Blood" was in the next generation of sheep. For instance, you bred your Merino to some other non Merino sheep- you would now have a 1/2 Blood. In a perfect world, you would have 1/2 the characteristics of the Merino and 1/2 of the other breed. The result should be a longer, coarser fiber. Of course, knowing that it is not a perfect world, shepherds were not always able to predict the fleece type of 1/2 blood or 1/4 blood. Unpredictable odds yielded finer or courser fleece than was desired, but at least they had something to go on!

All of this to say that all sheep today do not contain Merino blood. This system is merely used as a comparative system. In fact, the Corriedale breed ( one of our favorite) was originally a cross between Merinos and Lincolns (a very lustrous, long, coarse wool breed). The desired result was a sheep which produced a 1/2 blood fleece with a 4+ inch staple. The Corriedale became popular in the "sweater trade" because yarn spun from it was both soft and strong.

There are 7 Blood Counts - here is a chart of what that might mean.

The Numerical or English (Bradford) Spinning Count System

This originated in England during the 19th century due to the mechanized spinning equipment. This system figures the number of hanks of yarn, each 560 yards in length, that it is possible to spin from one pound of clean wool. The finer the wool fiber, the more hanks (greater length, thinner yarn) that can be obtained from one pound. The Higher the S number the finer the fleece. The problem is that there were too many variables involved and one pound of the fiber rarely produced the said 560 yards in the yarn consistently.

Which brings us to the Current System....Microns

There were flaws with the above mentioned systems due to the variations in both breeding the sheep and spinning a consistent 560 yard hank in one pound. With the onset of science and the ability to "see" things as they really were, this system of microns is the least subjective. It is the latest and greatest method, but one needing a microscope and a background slide with micron crosshairs for comparison.

A micron is 1/25,400 of an inch, so every fiber measured is multiplied by that amount to get the fineness. In the micron system the lower the number the finer the fleece.

The 3 systems Here is a comparison of the systems. The 2nd table will show different breeds of sheep. Please note that some breeds have a very large range of fleece grades within the breed.We have not included the hair breeds at this time.

Different for Mohair Just for fun, we have included the systems for mohair- the diamond fiber!! Yummy.

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