Sericulture is the process of breeding silkworms to produce raw silk. The most widely used silkworm is Bombyx mori. According to ancient Chinese texts, sericulture began around 2700 BC and spread throughout Asia and later to Europe. Today, China and India produce over 60% of the world's raw silk annually. Silkworms are fed mulberry leaves and spin cocoons from glands in their heads. The cocoons are processed by boiling to remove the silk filaments, killing the pupae. Multiple filaments are spun together to form thread that is wound on reels and processed into raw silk.
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Sericulture is the process of breeding silkworms to produce raw silk. The most widely used silkworm is Bombyx mori. According to ancient Chinese texts, sericulture began around 2700 BC and spread throughout Asia and later to Europe. Today, China and India produce over 60% of the world's raw silk annually. Silkworms are fed mulberry leaves and spin cocoons from glands in their heads. The cocoons are processed by boiling to remove the silk filaments, killing the pupae. Multiple filaments are spun together to form thread that is wound on reels and processed into raw silk.
Sericulture is the process of breeding silkworms to produce raw silk. The most widely used silkworm is Bombyx mori. According to ancient Chinese texts, sericulture began around 2700 BC and spread throughout Asia and later to Europe. Today, China and India produce over 60% of the world's raw silk annually. Silkworms are fed mulberry leaves and spin cocoons from glands in their heads. The cocoons are processed by boiling to remove the silk filaments, killing the pupae. Multiple filaments are spun together to form thread that is wound on reels and processed into raw silk.
Copyright:
Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
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Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Sericulture is the process of breeding silkworms to produce raw silk. The most widely used silkworm is Bombyx mori. According to ancient Chinese texts, sericulture began around 2700 BC and spread throughout Asia and later to Europe. Today, China and India produce over 60% of the world's raw silk annually. Silkworms are fed mulberry leaves and spin cocoons from glands in their heads. The cocoons are processed by boiling to remove the silk filaments, killing the pupae. Multiple filaments are spun together to form thread that is wound on reels and processed into raw silk.
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History of Sericulture :
Sericulture, or silk farming, is the rearing of silkworms for the production of raw silk. Although there are several commercial species of silkworms, Bombyx mori is the most widely used and intensively studied. According to Confucian texts, the discovery of silk production by B. mori dates to about 2700 BC, although archaeological records point to silk cultivation as early as the Yangshao period (5000 – 10,000 BCE).[1] About the first half of the 1st century AD it had reached ancient Khotan,[2] and by AD 140 the practice had been established in India.[3] Later it was introduced to Europe, the Mediterranean and other Asiatic countries. Sericulture has become one of the most important cottage industries in a number of countries like China, Japan, India, Korea, Brazil, Russia, Italy and France. Today, China and India are the two main producers, together manufacturing more than 60% of the world production each year. Contents [hide]
* 1 Production o 1.1 Stages of production * 2 Cruelty towards silkworms * 3 See also * 4 References * 5 External links
Production
Silkworm larvae are fed mulberry leaves, and, after the fourth molt, climb a twig placed near them and spin their silken cocoons. The silk is a continuous-filament fiber consisting of fibroin protein, secreted from two salivary glands in the head of each larva, and a gum called sericin, which cements the two filaments together. The sericin is removed by placing the cocoons in hot water, which frees the silk filaments and readies them for reeling. The immersion in hot water also kills the silkworm pupae.
Single filaments are combined to form thread. This thread is drawn under tension through several guides and wound onto reels. The threads may be plied together to form yarn. After drying the raw silk is packed according to quality. Stages of production
The stages of production are as follows:
1. The silk moth lays eggs.
2. When the eggs hatch, the caterpillars are fed mulberry leaves. 3. When the silkworms are about 25 days old, they are 10,000 times heavier than when they hatched. They are now ready to spin a silk cocoon. 4. The silk is produced in two glands in the silkworm's head and then forced out in liquid form through openings called spinnerets. 5. The silk solidifies when it comes in contact with the air. 6. The silkworm spins approximately 1 mile of filament and completely encloses itself in a cocoon in about two or three days but due to quality restrictions, the amount of usable silk in each cocoon is small. As a result, 5500 silkworms are required to produce 1 kg of silk. 7. The silk is obtained from the undamaged cocoons by brushing the cocoon to find the outside end of the filament. 8. The silk filaments are then wound on a reel. One cocoon contains approximately 1,000 yards of silk filament. The silk at this stage is known as raw silk. One thread consists of up to 48 individual silk filaments.
