Southdown

The Southdown is the oldest of the English down breeds and the ancestor of most of the others. John Ellman began improving the local sheep of the Sussex South Downs around 1780, and Suffolk, Hampshire, Oxford and Shropshire all carry his work.

They are small, blocky and short-legged, with a mouse-brown face and wool to the eyes. Historically the breed was prized for meat quality above all: fine-grained, well-marbled, and the standard the English trade was judged against.

Modern American Southdowns have been bred taller than the traditional type for the show ring, and the older, shorter form is now sometimes kept separately as Babydoll.

The trade is scale. Southdown lambs finish light, so on a commercial per-head market they are hard to justify, and the case for them is meat quality, docility and their fit on a small holding.