A huge variety of ram and sheep breeds satisfy people's needs for meat, wool, leather, milk, from which gourmet cheeses are made. These are animals that eat only grass and hay all year round. The costs of their maintenance are minimal. As adults, rams weigh from 65 to 180 kilograms (depending on the breed). In addition, some varieties of these animals produce the finest, high-quality wool.
Meat breeds
From time immemorial, sheep were bred for meat. In the course of folk (natural) selection, the most productive animals were bred.Meat breeds are distinguished by their large weight, muscular body and early maturity. The slaughter yield of meat after slaughter is more than 50 percent.
Any meat-producing animal recovers intensively in the first months of life. During this period, all the food eaten by the rams goes towards weight gain. Sheep grow until they are 2-3 years old, then their growth stops. Domestic animals are usually sent to slaughter at the age of 8-12 months. By this moment they gain 50-70 kilograms of weight.
Meat breeds: Suffolk, Romanovskaya, Gorky, Kuibyshevskaya, Romney-Marsh. This group includes: North Caucasian, Latvian dark-headed, South African Dorper, French Vendeen, Zvartbles, Texel, Precos. All these animals are united by such basic characteristics as heavy weight (75-130 kg), muscular (meaty) physique, high slaughter yield of meat (50-55%). Females are usually smaller than rams. But they give birth to 1-3 cubs, whose weight at birth is 3-5.5 kilograms.
Meat-tallow sheep
Meat-fat animals are bred to produce meat and fat tail fat. This group usually includes Asian sheep breeds. The most famous coarse-haired ones are: Gissar, Edilbaevskaya, Jaidara. Semi-coarse-haired: Sarajin, Tajik, Alai, Degeres.
All rams of the meat-and-fat variety have the following characteristics in common: large shape, heavy weight (70-130 kg), the presence of a fat tail in the back of the body. The wool of these animals is usually of low quality. The fat tail accumulates from 5 to 35 kilograms of fat tail fat.
Animals are bred in the republics of Central Asia and in the steppe regions of Russia, where sheep breeding is the main area of livestock farming. In Asian countries, there are even separate areas for breeding fatty sheep. Breeding animals are highly productive. There are different types of meat, fat tail and meat-fat.
Dairy direction
Sheep after giving birth to lambs produce from 1 to 3 liters of milk per day. In terms of fat content, it is one and a half times higher than goat's and three times higher than cow's. The fat content is 5-7 percent, protein - 6 percent. Delicious cheeses (Roquefort, feta, pecorino, ricotta), yoghurt and feta cheese are made from sheep's milk. Of course, all sheep begin to lactate after lambing. However, there are animals with the highest milk yields. Scientists are working on developing productive breeds, and dairy sheep farming in some countries enjoys government support.
Breeds of dairy sheep: German East Frisian, white Sardinian, Laconian, British dairy, Chios with black spots on the horned head and ears, Arabian Awassia with a brown head, Israeli Assaf with long ears, Dutch zwartbles. Females begin to be milked after lambing. Sheep usually give birth to lambs in the spring. They continue to lactate until autumn. When the lambs grow up, the milk disappears.The next lactation occurs after the next birth.
All dairy animals are united by the following common characteristics: per lactation, up to 300-600 liters of milk are obtained from one sheep, females are fertile, the weight of animals is, on average, 50-70 kilograms.
Meat and wool sheep
Fine-fleece and semi-fine-fleece sheep are bred for the sake of the highest quality wool. These two main groups of animals are divided into subgroups according to their predominant productivity. Fine wools can be wool (Grozny, Australian merino, Salsk), wool-meat (Altai, Askani), meat-wool (Volgograd, Vyatka).
Semi-fine-fleece varieties: long-haired (Kuibyshev, Romney-Marsh, North Caucasian), short-haired (Gorkovskaya), wool-meat (Tsigai, Gorno-Altai).
From 3 to 15 kilograms of high-quality wool are sheared from rams per year. The fleece of fine-fleece and semi-fine-fleece sheep is fluffy, thin and soft. Animal wool is used in the knitting industry. When breeding meat and wool breeds, not only fleece is obtained, but also meat. True, the weight of adult animals is inferior to meat breeds and averages 50-70 kilograms.
How to choose the right breed
Sheep and rams are selected depending on the purpose of breeding.To obtain meat, it is better to purchase meat animals. Usually they buy rams that have been raised in a particular area for many years. Animals are bred for sale by breeding farms and ordinary farmers. Meat breed sheep should weigh 40-45 kilograms already at 5 months of age. Usually these are hornless individuals with well-developed muscle mass.
It is better to buy young animals aged 6-12 months. Adult sheep are rarely sold, only if they are sick with something, are old or have low productivity (little wool, little milk, poor weight gain, low fertility).
You can tell the age of rams by looking into their mouths. In young animals, all teeth are healthy, white and intact. With age they begin to fall out. Toothless animals are deprived of the most important thing - they have nothing to chew grass and hay with. Of course, such sheep will not live long.
A healthy animal should have proportionally developed body parts. Pay attention to the chest, back, limbs, and head shape. A healthy domestic animal has a rectangular appearance, a muscular body, straight and wide-set legs, a short neck, and an elongated hornless head. Some breeds (milk, fine wool) are horned.
When purchasing wool (fine or semi-fine wool) sheep, pay attention to the quantity and quality of the wool. It is important to remember that animals should have a large amount of hair everywhere, even on the belly. Sheep with short, thin wool have folds on their skin, the optimal number of which is 3 on the neck and several on the body. The fineness of the fleece is determined by eye, making sure that there are at least 6 curls in 1 cm. The length of the coat should be 6 cm or longer.When choosing dairy sheep, pay attention to the shape of the udder and the number of lambs born at the same time. The higher the fertility, the more milk the females give.
It is not recommended to buy a sheep that has a hard or inflamed udder. Most likely, the female has mastitis, and this disease can affect the animal's fertility.
When purchasing young lambs, you need to ask whether they have been vaccinated against anthrax, foot-and-mouth disease, smallpox, and brucellosis. It is recommended to ask when the rams were given anthelmintic drugs. For novice sheep farmers, these animals die due to worms.
What breeds of sheep are most profitable for breeding in our country?
In every country, sheep are raised that are adapted to the local climate and pastures. These animals were domesticated many thousands of years ago. Each region has its own local sheep breeds. True, this does not mean that animals will not be able to take root in another area. The main thing when raising sheep is the availability of pasture, a reservoir or drinking water and a room where they will be kept during the cold winter.
It is more profitable to raise sheep of meat breeds. The costs of breeding such animals are minimal. Sheep eat grass in the summer and hay in the winter. The meat can be easily sold on the market. To obtain fur coats, Romanov sheep are bred. This breed is well known in the Yaroslavl, Kostroma, Novgorod regions, as well as in Belarus. Smushki are obtained from the Karakul breed, which has been bred for decades in the Astrakhan region and Kalmykia.
Meat-fat sheep are bred for their meat and fat tail. These are large animals that grow quickly and in adulthood gain up to 180 kg of weight (Gissar). They are grown in Kalmykia, Astrakhan, Saratov, Volgograd regions and in the republics of Central Asia.
Sheep of the fine-fleece and semi-fine-fleece breeds (Salskaya, Russian, Merino) are bred if the fleece can be sold. Traditionally, these sheep are raised in the regions of the North Caucasus, Stavropol, Kalmykia, Altai Territory, and Transbaikalia. These animals are bred in the Samara, Ryazan, and Oryol regions.
