[Bionic]

I thought it was a mix of breeds like a mongrel would be to a dog but someone told me that a mule is the result of the terminal sire being a Blue Faced Leicester.
I am spinning a fleece that came from a mule (a nice fleece it is too) but I cannot see that this farmer would be using a BFL so I am confused.

[Keepers]

A mule is a BFL crossed onto another to produce a milky ewe made for prime lamb production

You get welsh mules, north country mules, scotch mules etc, each one of those has a BFL as the dad and a hardy breed as the mum, dad provides the size, length and lambing %, mum provides the hardiness, mothering ability and longevity

I have welsh mules which are a cross between the BFL and a kerry hill or a welsh mountain ewe
North country mules are usually a cross between the BFL and the swaledale
and the Scotch mules are a cross between the BFL and the Blackie
There are also other types of mules out there

Most farmers who have mules wont actually have a BFL tup, the mules are bought at sales or off farm or bred but mostly bought in, they are put to a terminal ram to produce meat lambs that tend to grow fast and are easily marketed

This is a good website which explains it better than I probly have http://www.muleflock.com/muleflock_002.htm

Hope that helps 

[Bionic]

Great information 
 Many thanks Keepers

[heyhay1984]

I had wondered this too, thanks for the info 

[Old Shep]

Keepers - do you know how the Kerry Hill Welsh mules compare to a NE Mule?

[SallyintNorth]

Counter-intuitively, the BFL tups are often working on the hill, because they are tupping the hill ewes.  The mule ewe lamb and shearling offspring are then purchased by farms lower down, where they produce fat lambs and often also cross ewes for breeding.  (We cross them to Texel, Beltex and Charollais, and keep strong ewe lambs on as breeders; others on better ground may also cross them to Suffolks for the same purpose.)

Excuse for unsolicited pictures

First pic is Rosie Mule, my oldest North of England Mule. Mum was a Swaledale, Dad a BFL, bred on the Northumberland moorland farm where yes, we did keep BFL tups because our main product was mule ewe lambs.  We had to choose tups with less than very fine fleece, and they did need to be brought in if the weather got very bad.  As we tupped through November for April lambs, this could be inconvenient     
(The other sheep in the pic is Chad, my Shetland tup - nobbut a lamb at this time, and yes he really was that much smaller than Rosie, and yes he did tup her successfully )

Second pic is a batch of North of England Mules we bought in last year at 2- and 3-crop because on this upland farm we don't keep hill breeds so don't produce our own Mules.  Our neighbour does, mind - he buys draft Swale ewes, getting too old for life on the hill, and tups them to a BFL for a mule ewe lamb crop.  We did buy a pen off him a few years back and still have a good few of them here.

Third pic is the other type of North of England Mule - Mum is a Hexhamshire / Northumberland Blackface.  Bigger, stronger sheep than the Swaley Mules, give a better carcase and 'skin' (fleece) than her too, but aren't as thrifty, hardy nor as roomy as the Swaley Mule.  And often have less biddable temperaments too.

[Keepers]

Lovely sheep Sally 

Here are some welsh mule shearlings of mine, they are out of a Bealah speckle face and by a BFL

I have never had grass that good since 

[Bionic]

Lovely pics from both of you 
The fleece that started this question was given to me by my neighbouring farmer. It was the only 'black' fleece he had and said the wool board wouldn't want it. In fact its not black at all but a lovely mix of grey and brown. 
I finished spinning it this afternoon and then decided to dye it. Its currently cooling in the Burco boiler. The different colours in the fleece make for an interesting colouring when its dyed. I will post some pics in the craft section when its been rinsed and dried.

[SallyintNorth]

Black?  Mum must've been a Black Welsh Mountain then, I think.  You always hear that most breeds give white on first cross (unless Dad was a black BFL, which would be, errr... 'uncommon'  )

Yes, it should be gorgeous overdyed!   

I'll talk more about black fleeces in the wool sheet otherwhere and link back... gotta go right now.

[SallyintNorth]

Nice sheep, Keepers 

[Bionic]

Black?  Mum must've been a Black Welsh Mountain then, I think.  You always hear that most breeds give white on first cross (unless Dad was a black BFL, which would be, errr... 'uncommon'  )

Yes, it should be gorgeous overdyed!   

Well the farmer called it black but it certainly wasn't what I would call black. I guess he just meant something other than white. He doesn't have any Welsh Blacks himself. all of his are white with black legs. I will have to have a closer look to see if I can tell exactly what they are. Anyway, I am hoping he keeps her because he will probably give me the fleece again next year 

[Keepers]

One or two of my welsh mules out of the beulah have brown markings within the fleece,
one of them is entirely "brown bottomed"  we call her "Brown bottomed girl" she makes the world go round 

So could just be a funny coloured mule  or a BFL tup had a smiggen of coloured gene in him and its only come out in the one ewe, seeing as more people are using the modern BFL tups these days with markings on them it may be possible 

My mules out of the white welsh mountain are very creamy and white with a much fuller, longer fleece

[Marches Farmer]

This is the sheep stratification system, possible because of the many sheep breeds we have in the UK, able to cope with their local conditions however unusual or challenging.  It depends on the initial use of very poor grazing to support the mountain ewe and appears to be completely overlooked by the "rewilding" gang.  It's worked well for centuries and given us the upland landscape we presently have.  Wolves and lynx disappeared about a thousand years before it started!

[SallyintNorth]

or a BFL tup had a smiggen of coloured gene in him and its only come out in the one ewe, seeing as more people are using the modern BFL tups these days with markings on them it may be possible 

Skin colour and fleece colour are different genes, I think.

BFL is recessive for black fleece and there are very very few black genes about - they all get ringed and sent away.  You don't get patchy colours in BFL fleeces; they're either all white or all dark grey-to-black.

Yes there are lots of colours on skin on legs and faces.  These come traditionally in the north of England from a bit of Teeswater, which makes them a bit more hardy and puts the striking brown-and-white markings on the Mules' faces.  Such tups are sometimes called 'Crossing Leicesters' - they're registered and purebred  but would not be used for breeding Blue-faced Leicesters for breeding more Blue-faced Leicesters .  Buyers of Mules look for the marked faces on the Mules, because they will be that little bit more hardy.

Buyers of BFL tups for fathering Mules look for indications that he will put good markings on his daughters' faces... spotty legs used to be the clue, when it was still de rigeur to have a proper blue face even in a Crossing Leicester, but these days most Mule-breeding areas know all about it and Crossing Leicesters are more likely to have brownish or even brown-blotched faces.

In recent years, the Welsh farmers have been using a bit of Kerry Hill to achieve the face markings.  It does such a good job on that, that breeders elsewhere have been using Kerry Hill too.  It's rather less subtle on the BFL than the Teeswater though, putting KH-type markings on the faces of the Leicesters as well as on their Mule offspring.


I've attached pics of 'True Blue', conventional Crossing Leicesters and the more recent type from the recent Roman Wall Show in Northumberland. 

[SallyintNorth]

One or two of my welsh mules out of the beulah have brown markings within the fleece,
one of them is entirely "brown bottomed"  we call her "Brown bottomed girl" she makes the world go round 

So could just be a funny coloured mule 

Much more likely, I would think.  Love your 'Brown bottomed girl' 

Some of our Mules are really quite grey; the grey comes from the Swaledale, not from the BFL.  You don't see it when they're in full fleece, but you can see it when the fleece is off - on both the clipped ewe and in the fleece itself.