Amazing weaving

[Christina]

Check this out (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113223398) - it's spun and woven completely by spider silk. I don't think that I'd want the job of harnessing the little guys and winding the silk threads but the whole process is pretty interesting. I'd love to touch it and see what it feels like.

http://media.npr.org/assets/news/2009/09/27/detail_wide.jpg?t=1253912088&s=4

[Matty]

PETA wont like it. They already have a histrionic article of the plight of the silkworm.

[Christina]

At least they put them back.

The task of silking a spider starts with a small machine — designed centuries ago when the first attempts to silk spiders were begun — that holds the spider down.

"The spiders are harnessed ... held down in a delicate way," Godley says, "so you need people to do this who are very tactile so the spiders are not harmed. So there's a chain of about 80 people who go out every morning at four o'clock, collect spiders, we get them in by 10 o'clock. They're in boxes, they're numbered, and then as they get silked, about 20 minutes later, they get released back into nature."

[Matty]

Not good enough for PETA i'm afraid. How would you like to be tied down and have an essential part of your spidery being ripped from your body to make a rug for some person who would just as soon squish you as look at you?


That IS pretty nice though, how may animals are taken from hte wild, milked or whatever and then re released? Alpacas and now spiders are possibly the two examples i can thingk of.

[Christina]

I used to comb angora rabbits for their fur but they weren't exactly wild.

[Zygote]

I saw a woman spin angora right off the rabbit sitting on her lap, straight onto her wheel.

Spider silk is one of the strongest fibers, exceeding steel in tensile strength in some cases. They used to use black widow silk for rifle cross hairs because it was fine and strong. Don't think I'd want to try gently pinning down a black widow spider, though.

[Zygote]

I think I neglected to mention in my previous post that this is one of the most amazing textiles I've ever seen, and gorgeous to boot.

I've spun silk off the cocoon and I cannot imagine milking or silking a spider. It's such an involved process. That piece does belong in a museum.

My guess is that it would feel like a heavy silk brocade.

[Cath B]

Wow! I think this is lovely Christina.