Badger Face Welsh Mountain Sheep - Torddu

The Badger Face Welsh Mountain Sheep, hmmm yes, there are, in fact, two different breeds, the Torddu (black belly) and the Torwen (white belly) and yet in the books that I have about sheep breeds and their fleece the two are always clumped together and talked about as if they are just different colours of the same breed.  From information provided by the farmer from whom I got my fleece and who answered my question about breeding and colour inheritance they are not the same breed and have to be bred Torddu to Torddu and Torwen to Torwen.  The fact that they are separate breeds has now been recognised by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust who have now separated out the numbers of each breed and they are in two different categories.  I will do my best to try and separate out the information about each of the breeds which are usually talked about as one breed and I am writing two separate posts about them.

The Badger Face Welsh Mountain Sheep, according to the British Wool Marketing Board, was established in the UK during the 1st century but they don't specify which one they are referring to.  This post is specifically about the Torddu, which is pronounced Tor-thee, and this is a predominantly white sheep with black markings.  Only the rams have horns.  It has black stripes above the eyes and a black stripe running from the chin, down its front, under the belly and all the way to the tail.  The rest of the fleece is usually white but can be grey or light brown.

At the time of writing, the Badger Face Welsh Mountain - Torddu, also known as the Torddu Badgerface Welsh is in the "Other UK Native Breeds" category, according to the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, which means there are over 3000 registered breeding ewes of this breed.

They are usually found in mid-wales but there are small specialist flocks in other parts of the UK too.

Because they are primarily raised for meat, the fleece is usually secondary and most often little attention is given to it.  Kemp may be present and many take this as a theoretical indicator to the hardiness of the sheep whilst others find it undesirable.  Generally the fleece weigh 1.5 to 2kg with a 3-4 inch (7-10cm) staple length, I presume this is for both breeds from what I can find out.

Because the quality of the fleece can be so varied I will not comment generally on how best to prepare the fleece because that really does depend on what type of fleece you have and how much work you want to put in in preparing it and what type of yarn you hope to get from it.  It is not a fleece that should be prepared by the inexperienced, that is for sure! 

I originally bought this breed in as a 50g bag of washed fleece, it was all that the seller had left so I could only get one bag, and once I had combed it and got 25g of hand combed top I realised there was probably nowhere near enough for the project so that has been left to one side and then I have bought this breed in as a full fleece from a farm in Okehampton, Devon, that specialises in keeping and raising a handful of different rare breeds of sheep, both Badger Face Welsh Mountain - Torddu and Torwen, Whiteface Dartmoor and Herdwick.  They also raise Red Ruby Devon cattle, Berkshire Pigs, Aylesbury and Shetland Ducks, Black Orpington chickens and Pilgrim Geese.

My fleece came in at just over 1.5kg, including the bag it was wrapped in and I removed a few bits, like the small amount of black belly fibres and I have 1400g to sort further and wash.  It's very kempy and has an area of dark, almost grey fibres and several "marked" areas and I have pulled these areas off and have washed them separately to the rest of the fleece.

Shows the variety of fleece type within the same fleece

And a close up of those two different types

Now that it's dry the weight is down to 913g. So, how will I handle this?  Quite simply, my usual method of preparation, my Valkyrie Extrafine Wool Combs.  There is kemp of pretty much every colour imaginable in this fleece along with some coarse hair but I can also see some very fine wool.  Its the fine wool that I am after. 

These 4 photos are of the same small amount of fleece, first on the combs, then what was removed, the same fleece combed and then once I had dizzed it off the combs

So, now that it is all combed I have 199g of nice clean white hand combed top and 67g of nice clean but colourful top.  The colourful top and the original 25g of hand combed top will have to be dyed and used together in another project.

My finished yarn is really nice and soft to the touch of the hand and is a nice white and I have a total of 197g/512m of sport weight.  My knitted piece for the project took 31g/79m so I have a nice amount left to do whatever I want with.