Tales From The Cocoon

Another way to harvest the silk still starts with soaking the cocoons in hot water. Then the worker gently pulls each cocoon apart, removes the (dead) worms, and stretches the wet cocoon over an arch that looks to me like the rounded end of an ironing board. The worker keeps stretching more wet cocoons over the arch until there are many, many layers. The cocoons are then set aside to dry and the worker starts all over covering another arch with wet cocoons. Once the cocoons are dried they are removed from the arch and one side is cut so the pile of cocoons lays flat. These flat cocoons are then individually stretched until each is close to the size and shape of a rectangle to fill a quilt for various-sized beds. We watched four women doing this pulling. It looked easy but as it turned out the stuff is so strong that you really have to work to stretch it out. Even the guys in our group had trouble. Meanwhile these petite women just kept on pulling. Once they have a high enough pile of quilt filling they put it into a silk duvet cover. There are ties, rather than buttons, to keep the cover together. This is what went into our silk quilts and pillows.