Karen-Louise - not sure that there is a breed standard for them. I did ask about this once because when enquiring about the loan of a tup, I was asked which colour lambs I would like to get and I said I wasnt bothered just that any lambs I bred were healthy and of sound and typical conformation. Think the reply was that there was no breed standard because that may mean that the natural diversity within the breed was lost as people bred to the standard. Mmmmmm ...... will explore that more 
How would they judge if there is nothing to judge against?
Lets look at breed standards. In fact there are standards and descriptions, and each reflects the origin of any particular breed. Many of the breeds available today are 'manmade' such as the Suffolk, which was produced by crossing the Norfolk Horn with...um..the Southdown? Something like that anyway. The object was to get a big hefty sheep to suit a particular need. However, the genotype of the animals ie their genetic make-up, doesn't really matter - as long as they look like a Suffolk then they are a Suffolk - in broad terms anyway. What is not wanted is something which may have the same colouring but is weedy and has wool a foot long. So, they have drawn up a breed standard against which to judge the phenotype of the sheep ie what it looks like. With this breed, it is important that all the animals are pretty much like all the others. Of course there are differences, but breeders strive to reach the ideal Suffolk type.
With an ancient breed however, the genotype is of supreme importance, because the aim is to preserve the genetic make-up of these animals, as much as anything in order to use those genes to produce further manmade breeds as changing times and climate dictate. As with plant breeding, you go back to the original pure type to make the cross, which helps to get a uniform first generation cross.
However, the primitive breeds (I'm not talking all rare breeds here because not all are primitives of course) have a wonderful diversity within their genetic make-up, so they have more to bring to a mix than a standardised manmade breed might have. In order to maintain this diversity, a breed standard is inappropriate, so a breed description is used. This gives more leeway to allow variation in the type. For example, in Hebrideans the animals can have two horns, or no horns, or four or even more horns and still be a perfectly acceptable specimen of the breed. The description though does not allow for the animals to be too large, or to have white faces, or to have tails below the hock. The purpose of this is to exclude phenotypic signs ie those you can see, of the mixing in of other breeds genes (which you can't see, other than by these outward signs).
Going back to Soays, they do now, very sadly, have a breed standard, imposed by the RBST a couple of years ago when things were 'updated' and rethought. I questioned the RBST about this at the time but I was pretty much of a lone voice. The SSS did try to object but they were steamrollered too.
In the show ring, the judge is primarily looking for a good specimen of a sheep, then after that he or she will look to see that it conforms to the breed standard or description. After all, an animal may have the right number of horns, the right coloured fleece, and its tail may be just right, but if its teeth aren't on the pad so it can't eat efficiently, or it's down on its pasterns so can't walk around to reach its food, or it has only one teat, then it's going to be rather useless as a breeding sheep.
Have you had a look at the Soay website to see if there is any guidance on there as to what the judges are looking for?
Topic: showing ??? (Read 8475 times)
