What's in the freezer?

Trudy's freezer

I have a long term book project, which has a working title "What's in the freezer?' It would be a work of non-fiction stories based on what's in the freezers of a few friends. Each chapter would have a picture of the freezers prize possession, along with a story behind the frozen object. 

I have one chapter (and pictures) on wolf droppings in the freezer (fuelled by propane) in a Park Wardens floating cabin in the Broken Group Islands on the west coast. That chapter tells about the arrival of wolves on the islands, and their DNA, the poop on DNA or the DNA of the poop, so to speak. Another chapter is on bullfrogs -- freezers are part of the killed-with-kindness process which starts with a tub full of ice and ends in the frezer but you'll have to wait for the book. Then there was the rare bat in my freezer. Of course, I didn't know at the time there was a rare and endangered dead bat (if it is dead, does that means it is no longer endangered?) in the freezer until after I cleaned up the bat blood off the floor and exposed myself to potential rabies. The Health Agency couriered the bat for testing halfway across the country within hours of my innocent inquiry and you'll be happy to hear that the tests were negative. But, that isn't today's story either.  Nor is the frozen cougar head, which is a good story too, with a surprise explosion in a microwave (do not try to thaw a frozen cougar head by nuking it), but no, today's story is so much simpler.

Swainson's Thrush next to Camus seeds

Tonight I took a couple of pictures of Trudy's freezer. There was no reason to. It was like a surprise bed check but in this case a surprise freezer check as I just happened to be there and remembered my freezer quest. Besides, you never know what you'll find in Trudy's freezer.


There were three items of interest (aside from the Vanilla Ice Cream): a Swainson's Thrush (the Thrush is usually in the bag but for the photo, I exposed him somewhat) , Camus seeds (associated with the rare and endangered Gary Oak ecosystem of BC) and a 35 year old handspun Cowichan-style sweater along with a few, not rare, not endangered, but hopefully dead, moths, which was the whole purpose of the sweater-in-the-freezer.


The yarn in the sweater was spun (with integrity I might add - see the Integrity post) by Trudy and one of her friends and knit by a another friend. There is a wolf pattern on the front and a frog on the back. Last night the then moth-eaten holey sweater arrived at my door with Trudy looking for some handspun in natural colours to match the sweater colours. After returning home with some new yarns, Trudy had darned the sweater and, for good measure, stuck it into her freezer. By coincidence, I happened to ask what was in her freezer and lo and behold, the sweater, being prepared for another 35 years of wear.

The Secret of Cowichan Wool - the sheep

Washing fleece in Iceland

Thirty odd years ago when I took a spinning course from Judith McKenzie McCuin I remember her telling us about the Cowichan sweater yarn and what had made it so special - a yarn that was light, bulky, yet very warm. So the traditional Cowichan sweater did not weigh very much. She mentioned that the fleece was from sheep resulting from a variety of mixed breeds that provided wool that was high in lanolin (good for repelling water), and had a good crimp which was needed for the fibres to press against each other creating lots of air pockets which provides the insulation. Ever since I have wondered what breed of sheep created those characteristics (see an earlier blog in which I was still wondering). What did the early settlers and the Coast Salish women use for those amazing, warm, lightweight, sweaters?
Today I was reading an older issue of Spin-Off and came across an article written by Judith in which she provides the answer (MacKenzie McCuin, J. (2008). On Washing Fleece. Spin-Off Magazine, 32(3), 64-68.)! A cross breed of Churro sheep which had been left on islands in the Georgia Strait (now known as the Salish Sea) to provide meat for ship wreaked sailors or future sailors in search of nourishment, and down breeds such as Dorset and Hampshire brought over later by settlers. So, after 30-odd years I stumbled across the answer.
I now have an even higher respect for Churro sheep (see and earlier post about Navajo churro). The Gulf Islands can dry out in the summer and there isn't much in the way of green grass, hence the Churro would have done just fine, as they did in the American mid-west where the Navajo raised them.
Judith's article goes on to explain how the fleeces were cleaned: they were either spread over fences or hedges, allowing the rain to clean them or placed in a fast-running creek. The water cleans out the dirt and suint (a type of sheep sweat but it is a natural detergent) but leaves in the lanolin which provides the rain-proofing for the yarn which is ideal for this wet climate.
I wonder if there are any cross-breed sheep of this type left?
Edited to suggest a great book on the history of Cowichan Wool and sweaters:

Working with Wool, a Coast Salish Legacy . Although it looks at the history of the Cowichan Sweaters, it covers the history of the wool too.

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Cowichan Knitting - Fleece questions

I wonder what type of sheep fleece were traditionally used for Cowichan Sweaters. Judith MacKenzie McCuin, spinner extroidinaire and author of a couple of recent spinning books, told me years ago that she thought the sheep were a mixed breed of down sheep, that had adapted to the Cowichan Valley area. They would produce fibres that had a lot of crimp which would produce yarn that is light, holds insulating air, hence very warm and bulky without the weight. They also had a lot of lanolin which was kept in during the spinning to make a very rain resistant garment. I remember her telling me that a friend, Marg Meikle (who took the photo on the left), also known as Canada's Answer Lady (from the CBC) had researched Cowichan knitting and had written a small book on the subject.   So I contacted Marg. Marg has had Parkinson's for over a dozen years now, but that hasn't infected her famous 'need-to-know' drive. Marg told me that she had uploaded her book to wikipedia, and sure enough, there it is (all 78 meg worth). But in Marg Meikle's book that accompanied a Cowichan Sweater exhibit that traveled across Canada in 1986, it was mentioned that traditional sweaters were very heavy and that helped prevent commercial knitting machines from replicating the Cowichan knitting. I wonder if they really were heavy or if it was the lanolin that prevented machines from duplicating the yarn? Anyone know?
If you'd like to download Marg's book, click on this link and ignore all the ads as you don't have to buy anything to download it, you just need patience for it to start downloading. After a 30 sec pause in which they hope you will have second thought and buy something, it will start downloading but beware, it is 76meg, so if you have a slow connection it will take a while.

Nettles and Alpaca

Last weekend started with a conference on First Nations Traditional Foods.  Talks on Friday, then feasting and playing the bones game Friday night.  Spotted at the display was a dried plant with long stems, dried and looking like hay.  This was dried nettle. Wound onto a short stick, was line, somewhat like fishing line.    Saturday was a traditional food fair at the Snuneymuxw Long House.  Abe, who was studying First Nations root gardens, was cooking up a meal.  Potatoes done in a cedar box of water, heated by placing red hot stomes into the water.  The fire was removed from the pit to make way for ferns and salal which was quickly laid in the pit, vegetables added, more ferns and salal, a bucket of water, burlap and covered with a foot of dirt.  Abe removed the cooked potatoes with a handmade ladle, made of wood, twine made of young willow bark and nettle. 

Someone else had told me earlier that the Saanich First Nations used willow for their reef fish nets.  Judith MacKenzie McCuin (who taught me how to spin years ago) writes about indigenous use of nettles in the introduction of her new book The Intentional Spinner .

lipobibliophobia - the fear of being somewhere without a book.

Sunday, a bike trip along the old Cowichan Valley railway.



But first a stop at Pacific Sun Alpacas (by lucky co-incidence, just about on the trail) to buy some fleece. A very friendly and enthusistic owner who, of course, is a spinner, shows me how to sort a fleece.  I buy a sample--the neck fleece of Lumina, a cream-coloured alpaca-- to take home and try.  I'll bring it back and she will help me card it into rovings with her new carding machine.  Lipofibrephobia.  I buy a couple of bags of rovings to keep me spinning.