Nederlandse Bonte Schaap (Dutch Spotted) - The Netherlands

The Nederlandse Bonte Schaap is also known as Ônederlands Bonte Schaapö and the Dutch Spotted sheep, and it originates in the Netherlands.

Its origins date back more than 200 years, to around 1800, but it may have been around much longer than that; there are just no documents or evidence. We know from descriptions and studies of paintings owned by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam that they were in existence around 1800.

 

Generations of farmers and old documentation confirm that Dutch Spotted Sheep were kept in an area in the west of the country, commonly covered in lakes, bogs and swamps. Farmers reclaimed the area using connecting embankments and needed a hardy breed of sheep to maintain the grass, but more importantly, to eat any saplings. The sheep had to be able to walk long distances, due to the length of the embankments and also to withstand the acidic pH level of the peat bogs. They selected the traditional Dutch Spotted Sheep for the task, and ultimately, the breed played an important role in transforming peat bogs into sod strong enough to support cattle.

During the 1950s, farmers began to make use of the specific qualities of the traditional Dutch Spotted and crossed them with other breeds, such as Texel and Zwartbles, to produce a sheep with greater profitability and benefits with the characteristics of a modern breed. For almost three decades, Dutch Spotted Sheep have not been crossed with any other breeds and are now a pure breed sheep in their own right. I see a similar body shape to the Texel.

They do really well on just forage and grass, grazing freely on a pasture-based farming system. In winter, the provision of hay and silage would help with nutrition. They need access to a good, clean water supply at all times. They thrive in cool to mild climates because their thick fleece keeps them warm, but they would need shelter to protect them from really wet conditions, strong winds and snow. They can be kept in warmer climates but would require shade to be provided but hot and dry climates may cause issues as they need constant access of fresh grass, vegetation and water.

There are over 1,000 breeders in mainland Europe, the majority of whom are in Holland in the west of the Netherlands, but there are registered flocks in Germany, France, Spain and Ireland in addition to those in the UK. There will soon be flocks in the USA too, as the UK breeders are helping to get the breed into the USA via frozen semen and embryos, and the first 5 lambs were born in May 2024 at the farm of Mark and Karen Rogers in Vermont. The Dutch Spotted Sheep Society was formed in the UK in 2016 and The Dutch Spotted Sheep Society US was formed in December 2022.

They are light boned with a large framework and easy to handle with an inquisitive nature. They are considered to be a large breed with with Rams weighing 115kg-135kg and Ewes weigh 75kg-95kg. They are multicoloured, being a mix of black, brown, and white, and there are no specific requirements for the head or fleece markings and from the photos I have found online, they do vary greatly. The head is broad between the eyes and the ears should be horizontal or erect, drooping ears are undesirable.

Despite the breed being over 200 years old there was not an association or studbook set up in The Netherlands until October 2006. In June 2019 it was decided to set up an individual animal administration, primarily to be able to record the lineage and also the Scrapie status at animal level and a studbook was created in 2023. As of the end of 2024, approximately 53,000 animals were registered.

The Dutch Spotted sheep has been formally recognized as a breed in The Netherlands as of 1st August 2023. The sheep is a regional sheep kept by farmers in the South of Holland in the Utrecht peat meadow area between Leiden and Utrecht.

The wool is short, not very dense, somewhat wiry, but still considered good for the wool market. Hand spinners will appreciate the natural colours. The micron count ranges from 26 to 34, indicating that the wool is soft enough for some garments but might not be suitable for next-to-skin wear.

I bought this breed in as 100g of washed fleece back in July 2021 from the same lady here in the UK that I have got a lot of my breed samples from, especially some of the rarer British Breeds for my other sheep breeds project. She does manage to get some of the non-British breeds that are kept here in the UK too.

Look at just how black that black is!

For the most part, the colours are clearly separated.

Whoops! I forgot to include a measure but the locks were long enough to comb.

Her description of the fleece is "The fleece is similar to a down, with dense blocks staples and a lofty feel, soft enough but robust at the same time. Mixed colour, the colour patches smaller than a Jacob"

I haven't kept a note of when I combed this but it would have been within a few months at most of getting this in. After I had combed it I was left with 82g of hand combed top and I kept the colours separate as much as possible so that I ended up with 5 dark fibre nests, 1 dark grey, 1 light grey and 1 almost white. I done this to give me options with the spinning of the yarn and enable me to create a yarn with patches of colours, like the sheep, should I wish to do so.

Initially, I split the fibre nests into two, and then broke them down further into smaller pieces, varying the colour sequence as I went, and tried to make sure that each pile of fibre were kept in the same order as each other, which I already knew was going to be a nightmare to manage, but I had the intention of creating a 2ply yarn that had ever changing clumps of colour. Like I stated, this soon became a nightmare and unmanagable so I switched to making a chain-plied yarn. This meant that I would have to spin as fine as I could so that the resulting 3ply yarn would not be too thick to work with the 2ply yarns that I have already spun and knit. This is also a very bouncy fibre so will bloom once spun and soaked, so that needs to be taken into consideration too!

My yarn started and finished with a long length of the darkest fibre, and there are also long lengths of dark fibre throughout the entire yarn, as that was the predominant colour in the fleece that I had anyway.

I started spinning 22nd August 2025 and I finished the next day. When I chain-plied I ensured that the colours stayed together. Obviously there is a little overlap of colours to some extent throughout but, for the most part, the colours are kept clean and don't mingle too much, other than where I changed colours in the original single, but I kept it as clean as I possibly could. The finished yarn is 3ply yarn between fingering and sport weight, 13wpi and is 71g/214m, and not soft but its not particularly harsh either. Its an everyday, workhorse kind of yarn, that would not be irritating to the skin of most people so would make a nice scarf or something like that. Not luxurious but still a very usable yarn.

I didn't knit the project piece until 20th October and I used 41g/124m. It is not easy to read the words due to the ever changing stripes of colour, but they are there, and I think that had I decided to blend all of the colours together to make a more even coloured yarn that those words would be very visible. I love the different coloured stripes of this one.