Sheep (18)

A number of years ago I bought a silly mug in the UK, featuring "breeds" of sheep. Some of the breeds are real, but then there's shorn sheep, woolly jumper, sheepish sheep, Alan the Lamb (named after a cricket player), 32 MB Ram, Oxford Down, mountain bike sheep (a play on... mountain sheep?), and rebel sheep ("Don't be a sheep!"). Every time I use the mug, I wonder just how many breeds of sheep there really are.

Turns out, a whole lot. 

Fat-tailed Dumba sheep
from India

One 182-page brochure titled "British Sheep and Wool" lists 60 breeds, in the UK alone—and that's only the wool producers. These are subdivided into mountain/fell sheep and lowland sheep, geography defining the quality and protectiveness of their fleece. The American Sheep Industry, meanwhile, identifies 47 breeds, which are classified into six types: meat, fine wool, long wool, dual purpose, hair, and minor breeds. Hair breeds are woolless and do not require shearing; they are raised for their meat. Other types include carpet wool sheep (their name is self-explanatory); fat-tailed sheep, found mainly in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East and comprising some 25% of the world's sheep population; and rat-tailed sheep, originating from Scandinavia and northern Europe.

The website Livestock of the World lists over 200 sheep breeds, from the Acipayam, developed in Turkey, to the Zwartble, from Friesland in the Netherlands! There are, they say, over 1 billion sheep worldwide.  

Perhaps you've heard of Shaun the Sheep, created by Wallace and Gromit's Nick Park. Shaun is a Shropshire sheep. The Woolovers website features the five most famous sheep, including one that, along with a duck and a rooster, was the first terrestrial being in flight (in a hot air balloon, sent up in 1783 by the Montgolfier Brothers) and another that managed to elude shearing for six years: by the time he was rounded up, his wool weighed 27 kg (normal is 4 kg), and his shearing was broadcast live on New Zealand television. Then, of course, there's Dolly, the first mammal cloned from an adult cell. She had three mothers, one who provided the DNA, one the egg, and one who carried the embryo. 

Paški sir, or cheese from the
Croatian island of Pag

Fine wool is a favorite for knitters and craftspeople. Here is an explanation of the rating system for different kinds of wool.  And if you're interested in things culinary, consider the nine different kinds of sheep-milk cheese: Manchego (Spain), Roquefort (southern France), Ossau-Iraty (French Basque region), Idiazábal (Basque), Pecorino (Italy), Casu marzu (Sardinia), Feta (Greece), Halloumi (Cyprus), and Ricotta. Though if you go to Wikipedia, you will learn that there are actually 87 kinds of sheep-milk cheese. 

And finally, when I ask Google what the most beautiful sheep in the world is, the answer comes back, Valais blacknose, from Switzerland.

Though I'm rather taken with the Racka sheep, from Hungary.

And the Arapawa (a merino relative), from New Zealand.

And, to end with a breed featured on my mug, the good old Wensleydale.