Greyface Dartmoor Sheep

The Greyface Dartmoor, one of the English Longwool breeds of sheep, was developed and lives on Dartmoor, a National Park in Devon in the Southwest of England.  They are one of two breeds of sheep who live there, the other being the Whiteface Dartmoor.  Whilst they are similar in many ways, they are two completely different breeds of sheep.  According to the British Wool Marketing Board the breed was established in the UK during the 17th century.

The Greyface Dartmoor sheep, at the time of writing, is in the Rare Breeds Survival Trust Category 5: Minority (1500-3000) registered breeding ewes.  

They are a relatively old breed, developed in the 1800's by combining Leicester Longwool, Lincoln Longwool and the now-extinct Notts with possibly some Cheviot and Southdown bloodlines.  The name of Greyface actually refers to the greyish-black mottled colour around their noses.  

The Greyface Dartmoor is a small-medium build sheep with a whiteface that is spotted or mottled, greyish-black nose and neither sexes have horns.  The face is fringed with white wool. 

They produce a good size fleece that weighs 5.5 to 8kg in weight and can be up to as much as 15kg for a large ram.  The staple length can be anything from 6 inches up to about 12 inches long (15-30cm). The fleece is long, strong, curly and lustrous but if you're looking for softness, turn around and run a mile because softness does not belong on a sheep that lives in some of the harshest and most extreme weather conditions of the UK. 

This fleece can be picked and flicked or combed but make sure you tease the locks apart and open before you mount them onto the combs and do not overload the combs.  You will need to take very long strokes and keep your hands very far apart due to sheer length of the staples.  The fibres are so long and coarse that if you tug too hard on them you can actually cut your hands on it.  Its very slippery too and will both clump and drift apart if you cling to it.

Yarns spun from Greyface Dartmoor fleece are definitely suited to hardwearing textiles such as blankets, rugs and carpets.  The locks can be used unspun but woven into a rug too to make a fleece style rug.

I have bought this breed in as pre-prepared roving and it is definitely very coarse, as you can see from the photos.

My finished yarn or maybe I should call it rope is of coarse quality to the touch of the hand and you can see and feel the prickly hair sticking out all over the place and I have 91g/155m.  My knitted piece for the project took 42g/72m and what I have left I will use as garden twine.  To knit with it was really awkward and very uncomfortable on the hands and as you can see, there is very little stitch definition.