Twin Willows Farm
- Angora Rabbit Colors
Purchasing
bags of natural colored angora fibers can be
confusing. A bag labeled “natural black angora” is actually
filled with gray fibers. Another bag labeled “natural red
angora” is a fawn color. And what in the world in a “broken
angora”!?! How can a spinner order fibers, especially over
the Internet, and know what they are getting?
First it’s important to understand that angora rabbits have normal
rabbit hair as well as the angora fiber they produce. The
normal rabbit hair is found on their faces and on most breeds on the
ears and legs as well. The rabbit is classified by the color
of this normal rabbit hair.
The angora fibers it produces are always a dilute of the normal hair
color. To illustrate, the black French Angora rabbit in the
photo has jet black head, ears and legs will produce gray fibers on its
body.
Black and chestnut angoras have the darkest natural colored
wool. Chestnut looks like a wild rabbit in the normal hair,
that wild blend of browns and blacks, but the wool is predominantly
gray with some brown tints to it. Here is a list of colors by
name and what the fiber looks like:
Black
= deep gray
Chestnut
= deep gray/tan
Chinchilla
= sliver gray
Blue
= light gray
Chocolate
= taupe
Lilac
= light dove gray
Fawn
= buff
Tort
= beige
Red
= fawn
Smoke
Pearl = off white
Opal
= pale gray
Lynx
= pale fawn
There are three classifications of white angora rabbits, but they all
produce pure white fibers. They are the blue-eyed white,
ruby-eyed white and pointed white. The pointed white has dark
normal hair on it’s nose, feet, ears and tail, but the spinning fibers
on the body are
pure white.
Broken angora is simply a term for any colored animal that is spotted
with white. So a “broken black” will have fibers that are
white and deep gray. The fibers will be mixed and mingled to
some extent. Some people like the brokens for this piebald
effect and other dislike
the mixed colors.
Like natural colored wool, the colored angora fibers also take dye
beautifully. One of my favorite color combinations is to dye
chestnut angora with green. Dyeing any of the grays with a
soft pink is also very pretty. Have fun and experiment with
natural colored angora!
All
articles are copyright protected and may not be copied for any use
without the author's written permission.
Contact Pegg
Thomas at twinwillowsfarm@gmail.com.
|
|
|
Twin
Willows Farm
