Gotland Sheep Information

It is believed that the breed was first established on the Swedish island of Gotland by the Vikings. They crossed the native Swedish Gute sheep with Karakul and Romanov sheep brought back from expeditions deep into Russia. The Vikings took these sheep on their travels providing their crew with meat and skins along the route. Those early travels contributed to the spread of these Northern short-tailed sheep and the development of related sheep breeds such as Icelandic, Finn and Shetland. Primitive horned Gute and Gotland sheep still exist on the island of Gotland today.

Intensive and selective breeding in Sweden since the 1920’s produced the modern Gotland, famous for its soft and curly pelts. While the pelts were the most notable produce from Gotland sheep, Gotlands are a true multipurpose breed.

1. Gotland pelts - prized world-wide.

2. Gotland wool - beautiful, lusterous, purling locks for spinning and is a favorite wool of felters.

3. Gotland meat – lambs are active, quick to suckle and fast growing, reaching ideal slaughter at 5-7 months of age. The meat is mild, good flavored and close-grained.

4. Gotland sheep - robust, resilient, bright, active and friendly. They are easy to lamb, have a high lambing rate, produce abundant milk and have strong mothering instincts. Gotland sheep are very inquisitive making them an entertaining sheep breed to own. They are hardy and adaptable to a variety of management systems. Gotland sheep are a relatively small breed making them an ideal small farm livestock alternative. They are calm and non-flighty making them the perfect breed for children and families.

The Gotlands received worldwide attention when the movie "Lord of the Rings" featured the Magic Elvin Cloaks made of Gotland wool. The Stansborough Grey Gotlands from New Zealand were used for those garments.

Gotland sheep are not a rare breed worldwide but were newly introduced to North America through a cross-breeding program using artificial insemination.

At Ronan Country Fibers, our breeding goals are to retain the smaller size, naturally docked tails, polled ewes and rams and friendly personalities of the Gotland sheep by using primarily Shetlands and Finns as our foundation stock. The larger breeds which are also accepted by the Gotland Sheep Breeders Association of North American (Wensleydales and Lincolns for example) have size and breed characteristic that we wish to avoid. (e.g., larger size, coarser fiber, long tails, and, in my opinion, cloddy personalities!)

We focus on developing the wool qualities for the handspinning market and strive for wool fineness over the other qualities of Gotlands such as meat and pelt quality. We appreciate their fast maturing traits, however, for upbreeding purposes as we strive to breed for higher percentage Gotland sheep.

As handspinners are our primary focus, we are extremely pleased that we will have New Zealand genetics in 2009. Many, (including Carol Rhodes of Spin Off fame) considers the NZ as the softest Gotland wool available. The first Gotland sheep semen imported was from Britain. The UK wool is typically not as fine or as soft as Gotland wool from either NZ or Sweden. A Gotland fleece imported from the UK did, however, win top prize at The Maryland Sheep& Wool Festival in 2007.

Handspinners love color variety and we are breeding for multiple colors in Gotland sheep rather than just the traditional grey. Thus far we have been able to increase the Gotland percentage while retaining white, moorit (red/brown) and almost black wool. Gotland grey is the most recognizable but putting the Gotland traits on a sheep with the additional "flair" of multiple colors is exciting to us and our customers.

Ronan Country Fibers (RCF) is a founding member of the Gotland Sheep Breeders Association of North America (GSBANA) and has these credits thus far:

In 2007, RCF had the first 75% registered Gotland sheep in the USA.

RCF was awarded Champion ram, Champion ewe and Reserve Champion ewe in the first ever Gotland Sheep Show in North America.

In 2008, RCF has the first registered Gotlands from natural breeding.

RCF bred the first registered moorit (red/brown) and the first white Gotlands in the USA. No other 75% moorit Gotlands have been reported in the USA as of this writing. (2011)

Ronan Country Fibers remains the largest Gotland sheep breeder as recorded in the GSBANA flock book. GSBANA is the original Gotland Sheep association in the United States.