Moisture is Key

I have found out over the past few weeks how important moisture in the fiber and the air is while processing the fiber, ESPECIALLY ALPACA. I have been working on a huge order of alpaca for what seems like forever and as soon as the cold weather came along the fiber gave me the challenge of my life. It was flying everywhere and sticking to the equipment like you wouldn't believe. The static was so strong the the metal it was almost impossible to take it off.
To solve the problem we got the biggest humidifier we could possibly find. This helped the air and then to keep the fiber moist the most import thing was to keep it covered. After it was washed and dried I sprayed it with a mist of water and bagged it up. Then after I picked it I sprayed it with the correct amount of antistatic and placed it in bins for 12 hours before carding it. Finally after carding it I spray it with water again and stacked the barrels with the roving in it to compact it and made sure that the top barrel was covered waited another 12 hour and then I was able to pin draft it without it falling apart. This was all very frustrating while I was learning, but I'm glad everything is working again.