Robert Bakewell
Hill Farm Brie
During this
time we have maintained several breeds of sheep-always rare breeds.
We aren’t interested in having a large flock of sheep but rather in preserving
a breed that is both; beautiful and in need of conservation. In 1994 we were
fortunate to be given a satellite flock of English Leicester sheep. We started
with a ram and 3 ewes.
The Colonial Williamsburg foundation with the help of many generous donors imported a flock of English Leicester sheep from Tasmania, an island off the coast of Australia. The sheep arrived in Williamsburg, after many months in transit, in early 1990. The flock consisted of ewes from four different flocks and a ram, which is unrelated to any of the ewes to give the widest genetic base possible. The sheep came from prize-winning flocks, some which have been in existence for over one hundred years.
In the mid-eighteenth century, a wealthy English landowner named Robert Bakewell
began selective breeding with sheep in his native home of Leicester. These
sheep were coarse animals with large bones and long wool. Bakewell was very
interested in the meat production of these sheep because the English population
was consuming more meat than ever before. He began to select the animals with
the correct size and the best meat-to-bone ratio and after several generations
developed a “new Leicester” sheep.
Robert Bakewell |
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