Barb Lee
Wed, 31 Aug 2005 13:42:23 -0700
There was a time when we weren't so removed from our agrarian roots - when livestock were expected to perform a service to man, whether to transport him, feed him, protect him, clothe him, or all of the above, as so many of the livestock species do.
Gradually, it dawned on some individuals that animals with certain characteristics performed certain services better than others. Breeds evolved, and registries to track those breeds evolved as well. As the gene pool of a breed became concentrated, the characteristics of the breed could be reproduced over and over again, as in the color pattern of Hereford cattle (which, by the way, has a fight over polled/horned in its history).
The fact that a beef producer can spot a Hereford a mile off, tells him instantly some critical things about that animal, for instance, it's a beef breed as opposed to a dairy breed. He will know details about texture of meat, fattening capabilities, hardiness, temperament, etc., feed conversion capabilities, as opposed to, say, Angus.
Because he knows the characteristics of the Angus as well as the Hereford, he's likely to know what he'll get when he crosses the two. But if he starts with a Hereford that has a big white stripe around its belly, and an Angus with white legs and feet, he instantly knows that he's dealing with far too many variables in the genetic soup to be able to reliably predict the outcome of a cross.
Before working dogs and terriers and the like became housepets, they had jobs to do, and the physical characteristics they displayed began to be an expression of the type of work they were bred for. Every pure strain of animal carries the genes of its ancestors. The closer up the genes of a less desirable ancestor are, the more they are likely to express themselves in future generations. But even remote ancestors can crop out even in the most carefully planned matings. The more those outcrops are culled, the more remote the likelihood becomes of it ever showing up again, thus assuring that the animal will likely perform as expected. Breeders of working animals, whether for food or service, work to eliminate the variables in the animals they are breeding, so they can "predict the future by inventing it." (Thank you for that one, Carol!)
IMHO, the American Blackbelly as a breed still has the chance to invent its future by concentrating and distilling its strengths, IMPROVING on them, and following the well-worn example of breed creators before us, as well as those who are rapidly outpacing us.
The fact that there is more and more resistance to factory farming should give us a clue. We have gold in our hands, we are on the edge of an enormous shift in the food chain. We ought to be taking that gold and forging new links in the chain.
I have a theory that God gave us taste buds so we could differentiate between truly nutritious food and poison. When you're brought up on poison, like the 50's generation, your taste buds are temporarily fooled into thinking McDonald's hamburgers and Hostess Twinkies are food. Eventually your body corrects your tastebuds' error, and gives you a stroke or diabetes.
When you bite into your first taste of gently, humanely raised blackbelly lamb, your tastebuds come home. All of a sudden, your innate sense of survival kicks in and you realize you've been poisoning yourself until you grew your own food on clean, undefiled ground. You ought to be gobsmacked by the incredible gift you've been given. And you ought to be thinking beyond your kitchen table and carrying the message of whole food to the world. One little blackbelly lamb at a time.
Getting back to the reason for a breed standard, well it ought to be pretty clear. Somebody who had a vision for this working animal created a beginning point for you, and is willing to assist you in your succeeding generations of careful breeding. Each white spot you breed out, each crooked leg, each weak pelvis, each faulty pastern, brings your livestock closer to its Gold Link status, real working animals that are not toys, but a gift to the future of the breed, perhaps even the planet.
Barb L. _______________________________________________ This message is from the Blackbelly-blackbellysheep.info mailing list Visit the list's homepage at Blackbelly-blackbellysheep.info@lists.blackbellysheep.info http://lists.blackbellysheep.info/listinfo.cgi/blackbelly-blackbellysheep.info