HISTORY OF SHEEP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19558, 10 February 1927, Page 14

HISTORY OF SHEEP.

AN INTERESTING BREED. On the little island of Soay, which is situated near St. Kilda, off the west coast of Scotland, survives a breed of sheep, taking its name from the island which is now its home. It is probable that many of our flock masters have never heard of this breed, and yet, according to eminent authorities, it can claim the distinction of being a direct descendant of man's first effort in crossing and domesticating , the animals which now supply us with meat, clothing and leather, besides countless by-products used by us every day. According to authorities such as Professor J. C. Ewart, professor of natural history in the University of Edinburgh, there is evidence of the existence of a breed of sheep prior to the Ice Age, but this became extinct, and the earliest records we now have of domesticated sheep point to*a breed established in the south of Turkestan and Tibet about 8000 B.C. These sheep, known as urials, were apparently crossed—during the Bronze Age—with the moufion sheep, which was also domesticated, and these breeds were ultimately yso inter-crossed as to form practically an entirely new breed, which can now be seen, m an almost unchanged state, in the- sheep of Soay. These Soay sheep are described as bearing a fleece of short, fine wool of such density that the sheep can withstand the coldest weather. In appearance it is far from the ideal, being long-horned, narrow of body, long and slack in the back, and very difficult to fatten. According to legend and history, the island of Soay was stocked with the progenitors of the present sheep somewhere about 2000 8.C., when this was the only known breed in Britain, and during the Roman occupancy its wool had the reputation of being so fine in texture that it was used exclusively for weaving the Imperial State Robes.

The Romans are generally credited with introducing to the British 'isles the longwoolled, fat-tailed sheep of Central Asia, though other authorities claim that the Greeks most probably brought thorn, from Colchis; however this may be, it was on these two breeds, combined afterwards with blood from Spain—the Soay crossed with a sheep imported from the* north jt Africa, the progeny of which we know as merino—that the various breeds in th'e British Islands are founded. Thus we see in England, Scotland and Wales sheep of many distinct characteristics from the fine-woolled, plump-bodied Downs and Ryelands. to the hairy, horned. Highland Blackface, each derived by a process of selection of that type considered suitable to the locality in which its breeding was carried on. Soay wool is exceedingly fine, and is very valuable in the manufacture of fine hosiery. By some means, not understood by breeders, it has sot rid of all the hair from its coat, retaining only the wool, and the result is that the wool is of proportionately greater value.