I just found out today that you can make yarn from stinging nettles and that they grow in Utah.
I always have this desire to be creating fabric. Not just any fabric, but fabric from plant to finished yardage. In a book I read recently it says that nettle fabric has been made since the bronze age and that it is the sweetest of fabrics, being ideal next to the skin. Apparently the fiber is hollow and so if it is not twisted too tightly in the spinning, it produces a yarn that insulates.
Being made from stinging nettles, one must first take care of the stinging part. They apparently gather the nettles with heavy gloves and then hang the plants upside down for a couple of days so that the formic acid drys up and dissipates. No more stinging!
The stalks are then retted, just like linen, and then the fibers carefully extracted from the woody part of the stalk. This is the trickiest part of the process. The fiber that is produced is a lovely white color, unlike linen which must be bleached.
Nettles take no pesticides and do not use bleaching. They are much lower in negative impact on the environment. So, I wonder, why is it not being utilized more fully? Apparently it is the sting.
Labor intensive maybe. I just don't know. I would love see a piece of finished fabric. I would love to make a piece of finished fabric.