We got these sheep as a gift from two women farmers from the Pyrénées who came to Bourrou several months ago with the promise of taking over a farm from a retiring farmer.
They packed and stored their belongings and transported their tractor and farming equipment along with with their herd of 150 pregnant sheep on to their newly rented farm, hoping to start commercial milk production in the spring of this year.
After two months and for reasons known only to himself, the farmer changed his mind, sold his barn and rented his land to someone else. Threatened with expulsion, the girls had no choice but to dry off their ewes, keep the herd off the spring grazing and keep them inside in cramped and unhealthy conditions for several weeks while searching for somewhere to put them.
In desperation, they came to ask for our help and fortunately we found them enough land and a barn on an exploitation just a few kilometres from their temporary accommodation near our farm.
The girls have managed to sell some adults in their herd and almost all the lambs have gone for meat but these two little females from exceptionally good stock were bottle fed and it seems criminal to kill them.
They are big lambs – these two are just over two months old and, with a strange “Roman” face and a good appetite for milk! (We’re still bottle feeding for a while to get them used to us.)
The Basco Béarnaise originated in South West of France, they’re a good all-round breed and give milk for cheese, meat and wool and they’ve been designated a HERITAGE breed.
Heritage Sheep Breeds (HSBs) are defined as genetically distinct, geographically concentrated and adapted to their environments.
Typically, these sheep breeds are “local” breeds, traditionally farmed for commercial use and play an important role in the culture and rural economy of the regions in which they are managed.
Heritage Sheep Breeds are already used to support the environmental and economic sustainability of local rural communities and may reasonably be expected to become even more significant in agriculture in the community as low input farming systems are prioritised. In addition, with the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), breeds such as HSBs that are environmentally adapted to their local geographical regions will become even more important given the de-coupling of subsidies from production, with increased focus on the environmental status of agricultural holdings.
We’ve called the very white one Juliette and the bigger one Coco and we’re hoping they’ll do well enough to provide us with milk for cheese next year, I’ve already started Googling for recipes !