MEET BOUILLION

In our first year as shepherds, we only had Jacob Sheep at Rainbow Farm. Although the Jacobs remain our major breed, we decided to get a few representatives of standard commercial wool breeds to see what kinds of fleece the crosses would produce. Our first acquisition was a Rambouillet ram that we named Bouillion.

He was a distinct contrast to the Jacobs, being all white as opposed to their two-tone look. He's also much larger; he was only five months old when we brought him home and he was already larger than Quark, our full-grown Jacob ram. Where the Jacob's horns and ears stick up and out, his are turned down. His droopy face and little downward curving horns make him look like a miniature white buffalo. Upon seeing Bouillion, someone said, "You finally have a sheep that looks like a sheep! I mean, what people think of when someone says 'sheep'."

Comparing his fleece to that of the Jacobs is like comparing a plush carpet to a shag carpet. If you can get close enough to a Jacob sheep to touch it, you'll notice that the fleece is open, like long hair, and that you can run your fingers through it. Rambouillet wool is classified as fine wool, along with Merino and Corriedale, and is about two-thirds the length (called "staple") and diameter of Jacob wool. When you touch Bouillion, your hand just lays on top of his fleece; you would have to pry the fibers apart to get below the surface.

We don't plan on breeding him with any of our Jacob ewes, as we want to keep the Jacob line purebred, so we subsequently bought two ewes. Gwenyth, a Clun (rhymes with "run") Forest, has white fleece with a black face and legs. Phillippa, a Border Leicester, is all white but still a bit small. We were told that the Border Leicesters have a growth plateau in their first year, not reaching full size until their second year. We're not sure if she matured in time to produce a lamb next Spring. The wools of the various types are shown in the table below; data is from a book titled In Sheep's Clothing by Nola and Jane Fournier, Interweave Press, 1995.

	Jacob	Rambouillet	Clun Forest	Border Leicester
Wool Class:	Primitive	Fine	Down-type	Long Wool
Staple, inches:	3-6	2-4	2.5-4	6-8
Thickness, microns:	26-33	18-24	25-28	37-40
Fleece, pounds:	4-5.5	9-14	4.5-6.5	10-13

We think that we've got an interesting mix of wool types. We'll report on our cross lambs next year as they develop. If you have had experience in crossing these breeds, we'd be glad to hear how your lambs turned out.

Bouillion is from the flock at the Symphony Hill Farm in central Maryland.

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