Guide to Sheep Breeds

Milk production. Good milk production is useful if you want to have a sheep dairy (see “Milk Not Mutton”) or if you have a flock that has a lot of triplets or even quadruplets.

We featured 20 breeds for you in the magazine. Here we add 4 more.

Janet Wallace has raised sheep for fleece, food and fun. She is an organic grower and freelance writer living near the Bay of Fundy in New Brunswick, Canada. 

About the ALBC

The American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (919-542-5704) is a nonprofit working to conserve historic breeds and genetic diversity in livestock. The ALBC Conservation Priority List classifies rare breeds into five categories:

• Critical – fewer than 200 annual
  registrations and an estimated global
  population less than 2,000.
• Threatened – fewer than 1,000 annual
  registrations and an estimated global
  population less than 5,000.
• Watch – fewer than 2,500 annual
  registrations and an estimated global
  population less than 10,000.
• Recovering – breeds once in another
  category that still need monitoring.
• Study – breeds of genetic interest that lack definition, genetic or historical documentation.

Barbados Blackbelly 

Size: small
Appearance: brown, tan or red hair with black underparts and black stripes along either side of muzzle
Fleece: hair
Breeding: out-of-season; can lamb as often as every 6.5 months
Lambing rate: 200 percent
Behavior: active and alert, often nervous; highly protective ; good flocking instinct
Use: meat
Origin: Barbados from African stock
Environment: tolerant (also to poor grazing)
ALBC rating: recovering

An interesting-looking hair sheep. The lambs grow slower than in other meat breeds, but the ease of care may compensate for this. In some climates, can be raised without chemical intervention, making them ideal for naturally raised and grass-fed markets. The meat from the small lean carcass has a very mild flavor. Often used as a maternal breed to increase lambing rates and resistance to parasites. In the United States, the Barbados Blackbelly was crossbred with domestic sheep, primarily Rambouillet and the European Mouflon, to create separate breed called the American Blackbelly.

Barbados Blackbelly Sheep Association International 
815 Bell Hill Road
Cobden, IL 62920
(618) 893-4568