Now, here's some proper wool! Straight off the sheep, unwashed just as you'd see it in the fields. Still coated in lanolin, little pieces of vegetable matter, and general sheepy muckiness! Raw wool makes the BEST mulch and fertiliser - especially when you need to add plenty of nitrogen to your soil or growth medium. It's a natural pest deterrent - deer, slugs and snails hate it for numerous reasons. Plus because it's a fully natural product it's readily biodegradable and completely compostable, so it'll mulch down over the period of approximately a year.

This wool was sourced during Operation Wool. We pay above market prices and source it directly from the farmers, but we've ended up with a surplus.  Some farmers have brought other wools this year. It's primarily for going on the garden but some of it might be good for spinning. It's a little damp though, it's been a difficult season. 

Choose which wool you want in the drop down menu. It's mostly Herdwick, but we've also got some white wool and dark wool. 

The white wool is either Hill Cheviots, Kerry Hill, mule or Texel cross. 

The dark wool is mostly Zwarbtle or Black Texel, Herdwick crossed with Kerry Hill, or  Herdwick crossed with Zwarbtle.

Each bag contains 10 kg of raw sheep wool. Please note - this wool is in its natural state, just off the sheep meaning it isn't moth proofed or suitable for use in building projects or similar. Some customers buy it for greasy spinning wool but please note that we can't guarantee it will all be good for spinning. 

What is natural sheep wool good for?

Well, all kinds really. In it's natural state, just shorn from the sheep, wool is full of all kinds of great things, including lanolin, plant matter and sheep poo! These little extras are just fantastic for mulching applications in the garden. The wool (and little extras) readily composts down nutrients into the soil, it's nitrogen dense meaning it'll give plants with high energy requirements the boost they need to grow big and strong.

Not only this, because wool is naturally fibrous, and coated in lanolin, it's an amazing pest deterrent. The texture naturally deters slugs, snails and other slimy pests because they simply hate sliding over it - and the natural sheepy state of raw wool deters deer too! 

How to use sheep wool in the garden

It comes in distinct fleeces off each sheep. A typical Herdwick fleece weighs around 1kg so there are up to 10 fleeces in each bag. These may need a little tugging or teasing apart to lay on the soil, but then you can simply lay it on the ground around your plants as densely as you need to. 

Sheep wool also makes amazing mulch, it readily biodegrades, it's completely compostable and it adds a lot of nutrients to soil when it's left to break down over a period of time. It also helps insulate plant roots against frost, and retain moisture (so it's great capillary matting or growth medium). It can also be manipulated into something a little less raw, and a bit more structured like our garden felt, which can simply be cut to size and lain in the area you wish to mulch. Or felted lightly like our garden fleece - the perfect frost protection.

Then there's sheep wool compost. Made from 100% sheep wool and entirely peat-free this stuff is just an amazing growth medium for high energy plants, seedlings and the like. Full of nutrients and extra high in nitrates sheep wool compost really does give your plants a boost - and makes fantastic use of wonderful wool!