Few people spin their own wool nowadays—but even fewer spin material from dog fur. A dog farmer in Eyjafjörður uses fur from his 18 huskies to make yarn, which his wife knits into hats and other garments.
The family of five, who live just outside Akureyri, got their first dog in 2011, dog farmer María Björk Guðmundsdóttir told RÚV.
“It naturally only started with one, then we got another and then a third. The short version is that this just happened slowly over time,” she says.
As the pack grew, they began to use the dogs to pull sleds in sled competitions. As they got more dogs, they eventually started a business where they take tourists for rides on dog sleds.
“When you start competing with them on the sleds, you feel the power and what fun it is,” says dog farmer Gunnar Eyfjörð Ómarsson.
However, the dogs are not only used for tourism because their hair is used to spin yarn and knit from it.
“I mop the floors every day, twice a day when they are losing hair. So I started some years ago and started collecting,” says Gunnar.
Gunnar took a spinning course where he learned to spin from sheep’s wool. He then started to practice with the dog hair, which is considerably shorter.
María Björk then uses the yarn to knit. She initially made hats but aims to also make mittens and sweaters.
The hair, which has been accumulating for several years, fills three large garbage bags and is always being added to.
Gunnar says he will definitely never be done with the material and this is an ongoing project.
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