Designed & Maintained by |
History of the Perrymill
Flock
The first Jacobs were purchased
from a sale at Bishop’s Castle in July 1976. There were
4 ewe lambs and a ram lamb brought back to Perrymill Farm in
Sambourne, Warwickshire.
They were a mixed bag and some early attempts
at showing sheep brought about some rapid learning.
It took a few years to decide to concentrate
only on Four Horn Jacobs because of their proud nature and striking
appearance.
They are more difficult to breed because to
breed a sheep with 4 well spaced horns all curving in roughly
the right direction often seems like a lottery!
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Perrymill Jacobs improved and started to have success
at shows peaking in 1996 with Perrymill Fiona a shearling ewe, being
made female champion at the Royal Show and Perrymill Benson, a shearling
ram, winning the male championship and being given the overall champions
rosette. Quite a cause for celebrations.
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When the Perrymill flock of Jacobs moved
to Brettles Farm in 1984 the Perrymill name was well known and
was not changed but they had to share their environment with
North Country Mules, South Devon Cattle and Pedigree Shropshire
sheep and later, Charollais sheep and Lleyn sheep.
The introduction of Maedi Visna accreditation
for the Brettles Charollais sheep flock meant running two separate
sections on the same farm and the decision was made to convert
the whole farm to an accredited farm and replace the North Country
Mules with pedigree Lleyn sheep. |
This accreditation for Maedi Visna in 2003 meant
testing all the Jacobs and making them accredited too. As a consequence
it has no longer been possible to take Perrymill Jacobs to the major
shows.
Anyone interested in more detailed history of some
of the Perrymill Jacob breeding lines could click on the “button”
…tracing the breeding… to read an article that appeared
in the Jacob Journal in 2007.
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