Variation in fleece characteristics of karacabey merino and kivircik sheep at different ages

Abstract

The Kivircik is raised in the Thracian, southern and eastern provinces of the Marmara region and in some Aegean provinces. It constitutes around 6-7% of the total sheep population in the country. To improve the body performance and fleece quality of indigenous sheep breeds, German Mutton Merino sheep were imported to Turkey in the 1930s. The Karacabey Merino sheep were obtained by crossbreeding German Mutton Merino with indigenous Kivircik sheep at Karacabey state farm (Yalcin, 1986). Karacabey Merino is dual purpose (meat and wool) sheep breed. At present, there are approximately 0.85 million purebred Karacabey Merino sheep in Turkey (Ekiz et al., 2004). Phenotypic correlations between body weight and fleece characters in sheep should be known in order to facilitate the construction of a viable selection programmed for sheep in which all these economically important traits could be incorporated. The objective of this experiment was to compare the fleece characteristics of Karacabey Merino and Kivircik sheep.