Norwich bulletin., 1916-06-08
VALUABLE FIBRE MADE
 BY WATER RoTTINe PROCESS.
Discovery of Prof. Oswald Richter, an
 Austrian Chemist.

Berlin, June That a nettIe fibre or high value for making textiles can be recovered easily and cheaply by the WaLer-rottlng process, that rich yield or fruit sugar is thereby steeped from the plants, and that the stems make an excellent fodder is the triple discoy- cry of Prof. Oswald Richter. an Austri- an chemist He came to his discovery after some fifteen years of experi- ment1ng with ammonia solutions, only to find at last that the fibre could be separated by rotting the plants in water. It ali depends, however, upon knowing how to supply the water h. vesdgators had all along made the mistake of assuming that nettles must pc routed like flax; that is, they must be thrown into water and left there till the plants were sufficiently, rotted to permit the separation of fibre and wood. But this method failed com pletely with nettles, for the rotting process attacked the fibre as well and destroyed it. Richter found out t49e reason. Kettles contain much fruit sugar, which is all steeped out during the first half day that the plants lie in water, and then fermentation process sets in. This fermentation is due to the development of bacteria that feed upon the sugar and then destroy the value of the fbre After Richter established those facts he had only to draw off the water after soak ing the nettles for twelve hours, and then turn on fresh water. Now an other class of bacteria, which do not attack the fibre, is developed and rot ting proceeds as normally as with flax.
 The machinery for separating fibre and stalk is the same as for hemp, and existing spinning and weaving ma chimes are used in making nettle cloth, with probably a few minor changes. The cloth is already being actually made in Austria. About 1000 tons of the fibre was produced there last year under the auspices of the government, which turned it over to various fac l tories to be worked up. It is claimed that the flores are from two to twelve inches long. After having been wash l ed in a soap solution they are very soft and produce a cloth having a fine lustre. The yarn is pronounced con siderably stronger than flax yarn
 hence nettle cloth should prove re- markedly durable.
 While the supply of wild nettle in
 Germany and Austria is practically in- l exhaustible, it is assumed that it will
 be necessary to cultivate the plant ir l order to get the best results. In thai l case practically the only expense will
 be to plant the fields once with roots 1 of the wild nettle and harvest the crops during the next ten years. no further l planting being necessary. A German !, writer estimates that under the Ieasi | 1AVOFdDl6 circumstances nettlo HDrE
 can be laid down at the factory at 14 l cents a pound, which is hardly more l than the average price of cotton il
 Germany before the war. But his T calculation ignores the value of the | fruit-sugar and the refuse. As Rich
 ter found that the sugar contained ir I the barksof the plant runs as high aS
 8 per cent, he concludes that it is one
 of the most valuable sugar plants
 Known in Europe. Also he found thai cattle prefer the stems to most othel
 kinds of feed, and the leaves are also
 eaten by them with relish. In view o1 I these facts, it would seem that the l practical cost of the spinning fibre
 might be considerably reduced below Il the figure mentioned.
 Richter assumes that his discovers | will yield equally satisfactory results | with ranaie, which has hitherto baffleG all efforts to find a cheap and work
 able method for separating it's fibre | but he has not yet demonstrated this by actual experiment. As ranie Ii known to be about the best fibre plan in existence, it will at once spring ] into the foremost rank as a commercial fibre producer if Richter's expectations should be realized. Between nettles and ramie, therefore, there is danger
 that American cotton may meet witt
 strong, competition There is alread,
 considerable optimism in Austria ani
 Germany about nettles. The Austrian and Hungarian governments have
 taken steps to have nett1e fields plant, ed. The city authorities of Muenchen.
 Gladbach. one of the chief centers O
 the German cotton industry, have hat