[Womble]

Once upon a time, there was a stripy Dutch sheep. He was very lonely all on his own, so his owner gave him a stripy French hen to keep him company, and they all lived happily ever after.

Is there a consensus on whether this is:

A) A Zwartbles tup and a Marans hen
B) A Zwartble tup and a Marans hen
C) Utterly unimportant, and further evidence that Womble needs to see a psychiatrist.

[Buttermilk]

As zwart means black and bles means blaze both singular and plural are zwartbles.

[SallyintNorth]

As Buttermilk says 

Always thought it was Maran hen, though... so I've learned something!  (They're not stripey though - more speckley, I'd have said?)

[Marches Farmer]

The poultry breed is named after the town of Marans in France, where it originated.

[Womble]

(They're not stripey though - more speckley, I'd have said?)

I've seen both, but I'd say this lady is more stripey than speckley? 

[SallyintNorth]

The poultry breed is named after the town of Marans in France, where it originated.

So I discovered when googling! 

[SallyintNorth]

(They're not stripey though - more speckley, I'd have said?)

I've seen both, but I'd say this lady is more stripey than speckley? 

Well, she is, and if that's what a Marans should look like, then I'd say the Marans I thought I'd had were in fact Speckledys!  lol

[Fleecewife]

The Zwartbles thing bugs me too - but how do folk pronounce it?   It should be Shvart-bless or Svart-bless I believe, not zwartabulls.   BUT, as this is a newish breed to Britain, we can pronounce it how we want, and anglicise it til we're comfortable.   After all, the French say 'Londres' when they mean London........

[Womble]

We went to buy some recently from an older lady who was downsizing. She had kept them for years, and just called them "Schwarz" (pronouned Schwarts of course). Her phrasing was also interesting in that she said things like 'You have to feed the Schwarts or they lose too much weight', or 'Schwarts lambs grow quickly'.

It made me think that she might have picked this up from Dutch breeders she possibly bought her originals from?

[devonlad]

Round here the t gets dropped all together and its zwarbles. The most variation I've come across is for lleyns. Of course it should be the welsh double ll followed by een. Fave round here is clin but I've also hear lane , cleen, thin, theen and Lin. Less confusion with our Wiltshire horn

[Womble]

Well, if Lleyns are named after the Lleyn / Ll^yn peninsula, they would be pronounced the same as the place, right?  i.e. Khlinn.

The only person I know who keeps them pronounces it "Cleen", so when I first met her I thought she was telling me her sheep weren't dirty! 


Edit: Just spoke to a friend studied Dutch at Uni. She says "Een zwartbles ooi and Twee zwartbles ooien", which is also the consensus opinion so far! 

Oh, and Devonlad, surely it's Zwaaaarbles in your neck of the woods? 

[devonlad]

zwaaaaaarbles it is 
reminds me of a Devon farmer who is out walking his land one evening and sees a smartly dressed man crouching down by a stream, about to take a drink
" ERE, ee dun wanna be doin at- tis full o arse piss and cow s**t" says the farmer
"I'm terribly sorry but I've just moved down from London and bought that lovely cottage in the village which I plan to develop," replies the man "you'll need to speak much slower, I've yet to get to grips with the lingo"
"Oh I'm sorry, if-you-use-two-hands-you-won't-spill-any" replied the farmer helpfully

[Fleecewife]

I like that, devonlad 

[Hellybee]

Trying to put the pronunciation of LL and found this.


Put your tongue in the position as if to say H and L similtaneously . Breathe out gently over that. It's a crackly hard sound.


add een on the end

[Womble]

OK, Mrs Womble just came through to ask if I was choking.......