[Jacob-list] tails

[Betty Berlenbach]

So, now do you think that was a variation on the boys' gym shower room comparisons, or a variation on the Victorian "curtains hanging all the way to the floor and beyond, to show we have enough money to buy extra material" bit.  

I think there's plenty of variation with tails within the breed standard.  I have a couple with longish tails, but the actual bone of the tail is not below the hock.  The tails are just very furry and long haired, as are the fleeces on those two.  Some of the length is taken up in fleece/hair/whatever.  Ingrid told me that it is the bone that has to be no longer than hock, not the fiber.  These two little girls are iffy, in that they have such "furry" tails, but I'm waiting to see them at their full height, to see if legs growing, the tails don't seem to be all that long anyway.  Then, I'll see what happens to them.  They came from a ewe who had been docked, and who consistently produces longer tails than the others, but when I started, I didn't know much about tails and docking, so I was a prime sucker for buying docked ewes without inquiring about the original tail length.  She has produced beautiful lambs in all other regards, so I haven't culled her descendents totally out of the flock.  Trying, over time, to shorten the tail.  However, since the tails are there, there is always truth in advertising, and my customers know what they are getting!
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Neal and Louise Grose 
  To: jacob-list at jacobsheep.com 
  Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2004 6:29 PM
  Subject: Re: [Jacob-list] tails


  We have pretty much stopped docking tails, though here in North Carolina, there is some greater need. This is more for cleaner looks than for health. There is a greater tendency to tag. They do make a nice jingling sound when they run. We have also stopped castrating, since our primary market is for our Muslim friends.

  I know the Breed Standard is for a tail approximately the length of the hocks, but I am not willing to bet the farm that there is not some natural variation in length. It would be interesting to get some feed-back on number of vertebra, and how this compares with actual length.

  By the way, somewhere I read that years ago, domestic sheep WERE bred for longer tails as a status symbol or something. We have forgotten more through the years than we know.

  Neal Grose
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Dave & Katrina 
    To: jacob-list at jacobsheep.com ; Betty Berlenbach 
    Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2004 6:25 PM
    Subject: RE: [Jacob-list] tails



    ....JSBA standards (the notebook description) says that tail length is an indication of breed purity.   Other shepherds have also said that tail length is one indication of primitiveness/commercial...that is, most primitive sheep have short tails (above the hock), most domesticated sheep have long tails (below the hock).  I wonder why that is?  Surely we would not have tried to breed for long tails!  ....


    Katrina Lefever, Chicory Lane Farm

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.pairlist.net/pipermail/jacob-list/attachments/20040116/34174218/attachment.htm