All have a naturally short tail, their soft, short wool molts and can be rooed (hand plucked) in the spring. Ewes lamb very easily with few problems even when older, twins are common. As browsers they thrive on land often considered too marginal for use by more domesticated breeds and are useful in eradicating blackberries and other noxious weeds. Females commonly weigh less than 50 pounds and rams less than 80 which makes them very manageable, even for one person. Their light weigh makes them easy on pastures. Soay are delightful to live with and very forgiving making them an ideal livestock breed for beginners. Comparatively low in maintenance they make a wonderful addition to a small farmyard.

British Soay are being kept in the US as part of a global conservation effort to preserve this historical archive as an undiluted genetic reservoir for the future. Because the US flock is a controlled population (a small group with complete breeding records) it also provides a unique opportunity to study inheritance in sheep. The wool is prized as a novelty by hand spinners and artisan weavers and it is especially suited for felting. The low fat, tasty meat is ideal for personal consumption or gourmet meat markets and the sheep's value for conservation grazing / forest fuel reduction is just beginning to be recognized in the United States.   
 

         
                                                                          British Soay ewe lamb, April 2011                                               
               
                                                                                      
           

Who are we and how did we discover Soay Sheep?

We are Val Dambacher and Kathie Miller, two Pacific Northwest friends from Oregon, who fell in love with these marvelous little Scottish sheep and whose husbands gladly encouraged our association so they would not have to listen to us talk about Soay.

Val (now retired) had raised sheep since her move to Oregon in 1992 while I, on the other hand had respected my husband's request "to bring anything home, but sheep!" For 25 years I raised everything else, until one evening the phone rang and the woman on the other end of the line said she needed a home for some SMALL and very RARE..... I didn't hear the rest. Within the week I was a sheep farmer. My only regret now is that I did not know about Soay sheep while I was living in southern California; they would have been the perfect animals for my "farmette" in the city.

As our passion for these sheep grew we made friends in both Canada and Great Britain. Over the course of three years, 1998, 1999 and 2000 we imported the only flock of Soay sheep outside of Europe from Montreal, Canada to Oregon. In 1999 we were able to get the sheep reinstated in the Combined Flock Book of the Rare Breeds Survival Trust in England. As a result of these opportunities and of our travels throughout the UK, including St. Kilda, conserving this faunal treasure became our mission. US born Soay registered with the RBST are reciprocal (interchangeable) with Soay in Britain and as a result I was able (after Val retired) to establish an artificial insemination program with the help and support of Christine Williams a breeder in the UK. With semen she had collected from four of her registered rams in 2007 and 2010 the very narrow gene pool that we had been forced to work with from the beginning was finally  widened. The first "AI" lambs were born in 2008, a second round in 2010 and a third in April 2011. More are planned.

Southern Oregon Soay Farms is a member of the Soay Sheep Society (UK), the RBST (UK),   the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (ALBC) and Sheep and Friends, A Circle of British Soay Conservationists (US). Our sheep are all registered in the Combined Flock Book of the RBST and we have been enrolled in the federal Voluntary Scrapie Program since 1999. Visitors and inquiries are always welcomed.

                                        
                                                      "Maya", Kathie, Val and "Lindy" (Nene gosling)

                                       We hope you enjoy the information on our site.
Click on the links below to learn more about Soay Sheep and how to care for them.

                                                             
                    *  British Soay is a term used only in the U S and Canada to distinguish RBST registered Soay sheep
                                       from North American Soay Sheep which are only registered in the United States.