University Students

We had a lucky break in the rainy season for a group of university students who came over and dyed some tenugui. It always amazes me that even with the exact same technique each persons tenugi comes out different.

A new backstrap loom class for beginners.

Three very enthusiastic students have made up a Friday class. To keep it interesting I have all three of them weaving something slightly different. Koike san is weaving saki ori for the first time. (Actually it was the first time she wove anything today.) I had some old silk kimono lining that I dyed with madder and Lac. Perfect to rip into fine strips and weave.

Takeshima san is weaving some fine white paper thread she will later surface design with indigo and persimmon tannin.



Kameii san is weaving a gorgeous random indigo hemp stripe. Picture to come.

My Karma is going to pay for this..

I 'll probably be born as a silkworm in my next million lives ( A rough estimate of the number of silkworms I will have raised and then killed in this life.) and for eternity face one of the several choice fates the silkworms have faced because of me.

Left alone the silk moth will melt a hole in the cocoon ten days after the silkworm had spun it in order to escape and mate. The cocoon would then be useless for reeling with breaks in the continuous fiber. So I have to kill the chrysalis. There are a few techniques. Slightly salting the cocoons to dry them. Boiling and then reeling before the moth is formed. Keeping them in the fridge for a long cold slow death or placing them on the scorching hot tin metal roof on my kitchen to dry out in the sun.

Today I used the hell-hot-roasting-roof to do the trick.

Just to put some faces to the last silk farmers in my area.

Jimbo sans are over 80. This will be their last year raising silkworms. Both of them have raised silkworms their entire lives.
They are self-sufficient rice farmers as well as making their own miso and tofu from their own soybeans. Wow.

Primitive Critter

Silkworms have been bred for docility as well as the quality of the silk over thousands of years. The modern hybrids won't walk more than a few centimetres to find food. If the mulberry isn't directly overhead or right beside them they would starve before going foraging for themselves. It would be just to much trouble to raise a lot of wander lusting silkworms hiding in all corners of the house. They have to stay in place. Like foot-binding the ancient Chinese were very good with limiting mobility for convenience sake. The urge to walk was simply bred out.

There is still a variety of wild silkworm closely related to his/her contemporary cousins. They are called kuwako locally. They seem Cro-Magnon like. Stockier with a large brow. Slightly hairier. Almost always found solitary disinterestedly nibbling on leaf they seem to have been cast out from all the games the other reindeer play.

You can find them occasionally on the back of mulberry leaves brought home to feed their domesticated relatives . I've tried to keep the wild ones from straying, tempting them with the freshest choice mulberry I can find. Alas, they are a free spirited variety and need to roam. So they end up on the mulberryless ceiling or squashed on the floor. I found this sexy pre-historic one on the leaves last night and is now relocated to the dozens of saplings in front of the house. I hope it hangs around long enough to make a cocoon.

You can find their thin beige-coloured cocoons in the dead of winter clinging to the bare branches of the sleeping mulberry. (See January 3rd blog picture.) A small hole on the top of the cocoon to show that no one is home and the occupant flew off as a moth months before.

Just for reference here is a photo of his modern cousins.

Mulberry Rolls

This gets a little carried away but some mothering instinct in me gets me to waste time rolling up these mulberry rolls for the kids. They are easy to slice and taking the extra time with small details like this actually makes being busy seem less busy. The silkworms will be two weeks old tomorrow.

Indigo Seedlings: Second Time Lucky

Thinking I was on the ball I had my indigo planted early this year. A late frost and I lost the entire batch. I replanted quite late and am welcomed by the sight of these seedlings a month behind schedule but better late than never.