Meat
Wensleydale
C tier
Wensleydale is a large white longwool from North Yorkshire with a distinctive lustrous curly fleece and blue-grey skin tinge on the face. Historically used as a crossing sire on hill ewes, purebreds today are valued for fibre craft and specialty meat from conservation flocks. Lamb from Wensleydale crosses grows long in the body with mild flavour and decent fat cover when finished on dale pastures. Purebred meat is less common but yields generous shoulders and legs suited to slow roasting; the character is softer than blackface hill lamb.
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Characteristics
Preparations
Traits
Grading systems
Grades are placed along a shared scale so systems can be compared side by side.
History
Richard Outhwaite and others developed a lustrous longwool type in Wensleydale from Leicester and local stock.
Breed society recording fixed Wensleydale as a crossing and pure longwool breed.
Wensleydale rams sired Masham and other northern cross ewes for commercial systems.
Declining numbers placed the breed under conservation while niche meat sales continued.