Katahdin Sheep

Breed Origin

The development of the breed began in the late 1950’s with the importation of a small number of haired sheep from the Caribbean by Michael Piel of Maine. The Piel Farm had several thousand sheep at the time and Piel felt that “progress in selection for traits important to the production of meat would be greatly enhanced by the elimination of wool as a major factor for selection.” His goal was to combine the hair coat, prolificacy, and hardiness of the Virgin Island sheep with the meat conformation and rate of growth of wool breeds. He began to experiment with crosses between the hair sheep and various British breeds, especially Suffolk. After almost 20 years of crossing the resulting hybrids “in every conceivable combination” and selecting the individuals with the desired combination of traits, Piel eventually collected a flock of ewes he called KATAHDINS, named after Mt. Katahdin in Maine. During the mid 1970’s the Wiltshire Horn, a shedding breed from England, was incorporated into the flock to add size and improve carcass quality.

From this original flock, new breeders have been able to expand the number of Katahdin sheep in North America and many other countries, and select carefully for hair coat, carcass quality, and reproductive efficiency. In 1986, a breeders organization, Katahdin Hair Sheep International (KHSI) was formed. Its purposes are to:

* Register individual Katahdins and record performance
* Assist in promotion and marketing
* Encourage research and development related to the breed.

All Katahdins eligible for registration are inspected after one year of age to insure conformity with the standard of type. Breeders are required to be KHSI members to register sheep or request flock inspection. (Note: Lambs from 100% registered parents born after 1/1/98 no longer require inspection)

There are provisions for producers to follow an upgrading program to develop a purebred Katahdin flock by recording each cross with KHSI.

Katahdin sheep display many desirable economic traits. In order to scientifically document and test these traits, Katahdin breeders have been involved in several experimental trials.

Studies of internal parasite tolerance in Arkansas indicate that Katahdin sheep possess a significantly higher degree of parasite resistance than wool sheep that they were compared to. Heat tolerance trials demonstrated a similar relationship. Other traits being studied at research institutions include out-of-season breeding, prolificacy and fertility factors, carcass quality and meat flavor, and growth performance.

Breed History

Katahdin sheep are a breed of hair sheep developed in the United States, a small but growing element of the sheep industry in North America. There are 100 million hair sheep around the world—10% of the world’s sheep population—of which 90% are in Africa and 10% are in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The Katahdin breed originated at the Piel Farm in north central Maine where Michael Piel was an innovator and “amateur geneticist” who enjoyed raising livestock. His first intentions related to establishing a sheep enterprise were to use sheep to graze power lines instead of spraying or mowing the vegetation. He then developed other ideas on how to employ sheep for land management.

Barbara Piel wrote:

“From the time Michael was in high school and had a small flock of Suffolks, he was fascinated by sheep, their history and management. When he moved to Maine after World War II, he raised Corriedales and Columbias, but the market for wool set him thinking about a meat sheep that wouldn’t need shearing. If the grower wanted to concentrate on the lamb market, he had no choice but to grow wool as well; so he began research and correspondence to firm up his ideas on how to produce a meat sheep.”

In 1956 and 1957, Piel began making inquiries about hair sheep after seeing pictures in a National Geographic magazine of West African hair sheep. He eventually made contact with Richard Bond of the U.S. Agricultural Research Service in St. Croix, Virgin Islands who was working with hair sheep flocks on the island.

Piel imported “African Hair Sheep,” as they were called then, to Maine from St. Croix in November 1957. All were less than a year of age, born triplets, unrelated for many generations, and wool-less with wool-less siblings. One female was tan in color, the others were white. The ram lamb, “King Tut,” was used for breeding a handful of ewes in December 1957, including Tunis, Southdown, Hampshire, Suffolk, and the “African” ewe lambs. From this point on, crosses of many breed combinations (including Cheviots and other “Down” breeds), were made as Piel tried to determine what would create the type of ewe he was looking for. He was particularly selecting for hair coat, meat-type conformation, high fertility, and flocking instinct.

In the early 1970s, Piel felt he had come close to his goal of a “meat sheep that did not require shearing.” He selected from his large flock approximately 120 of the best ewes and called them “Katahdin” sheep after Mt. Katahdin, the highest peak in the state of Maine.

In October 1975, Piel imported a handful of Wiltshire Horn sheep from Wales via Canada. He intended to improve size and bone by incorporating the Wiltshire into the Katahdins. The first crosses were born in 1976.

Paul and Margaret Jepson of Vermont had become acquainted with Piel while trying to locate Wiltshire Horn stock and decided the newly developed Katahdins would suit them better. They purchased some sheep from Piel in the mid-1970s and established the first satellite flock of Katahdins. The Jepson’s then experimented with incorporating St. Croix blood (another hair sheep breed akin to the original “African Hair” type) into their flock in the early 1980s.

Interest and enthusiasm for the breed has developed steadily since those early days. Over 20 years later, at the end of 2008, KHSI has registered and recorded over 75000 animals and has had a membership averaging 500 members throughout North America since 2000. Since 2001, KHSI has been in the top 6 registries in the USA in terms of number of animals registered per year. Mandatory inspection of registered Katahdins continued through 1998, strengthening predictability of hair coat and standard of type. Commercial flocks of Katahdin and Katahdin cross ewes have become more popular for efficient, low input meat lamb production. Hundreds of Katahdins have been exported to Central and South America, the Caribbean, Southeast Asia and the United Kingdom. The Katahdin breed has proven to be adaptable, easy to manage and efficient—no wonder it is a “breed whose time has come.”

This content was sourced from the Katahdin Hair Sheep International; Breed Origin and History,

 https://www.katahdins.org/about-the-breed/history/