The Black Welsh Mountain sheep is a colour type of the Welsh Mountain sheep. It occurs occasionally in flocks of other colours, but is now often maintained as a separate strain. Like other Welsh Mountain sheep it is found mainly on the hills in Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

, but is also kept elsewhere.

Introduced into the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in 1973 through a single importation of 3 rams and 13 ewes by Mr. Tom Wyman of New York, the fleece from the Black Welsh Mountain has generated special interest among hand spinners and weavers. As only 2 rams survived quarantine, the US flock is genetically descended from these 2 sire lines with only an additional importation of frozen sheep semen in the late 1990s to add some genetic diversity to the US herds.

A significant herd of Black Welsh Mountain Sheep can be found at the Potato Hill Farm in upstate NY (Boonville, NY).

Characteristics

Apart from being wholly black, the Black Welsh Mountain is like other Welsh Mountain sheep – small and hardy with no wool on the face or legs; the males are horn

Horn (anatomy)

A horn is a pointed projection of the skin on the head of various animals, consisting of a covering of horn surrounding a core of living bone. True horns are found mainly among the ruminant artiodactyls, in the families Antilocapridae and Bovidae...

ed, but females are normally polled

Polled livestock

Polled livestock are livestock without horns, of species that normally have them. The term refers both to breeds or strains which are naturally polled through selective breeding and also to naturally horned animals which have been dehorned...

.
A small number of wild Mouflon sheep were introduced from Sardinia in 1906 and from Corsica in 1908 to Lambay Island (off the coast of Dublin) where they produced offspring. These were crossed with Welsh Black Mountain sheep (a breed society for WBM was formed in 1922)and the inheritance of their wool-colour studied (Fraser Roberts, A. J. 1931 Colour inheritance in sheep; vi The genetic constitution of the Wild Mouflon, J. Genetics XXV (1)).

External links

• American Black Welsh Mountain Sheep Association
• UK Black Welsh Mountain Sheep Breeders' Association