The Tunisian Barbarin is a Tunisian
breed
A breed is a specific group of breedable domestic animals having homogeneous appearance (phenotype), homogeneous behavior, and/or other characteristics that distinguish it from other organisms of the same species. In literature, there exist seve ...
of
fat-tailed sheep
The fat-tailed sheep is a general type of domestic sheep known for their distinctive large tails and hindquarters. Fat-tailed sheep breeds comprise approximately 25% of the world's sheep population,
and are commonly found in northern parts of Af ...
. It is distributed throughout Tunisia, and on both sides of the Tunisian border with Algeria, on the Algerian side particularly in the area of
Oued Souf. Related to the Awassi
History
The Tunisian Barbarin descends from the
Near East Fat-tailed. Two Italian breeds, the
Barbaresca Siciliana of Sicily and the
Laticauda
Sea kraits are a genus of venomous snakes (subfamily: Laticaudinae), ''Laticauda''. They are semiaquatic, and retain the wide ventral scales typical of terrestrial snakes for moving on land, but also have paddle-shaped tails for swimming. Unlike ...
of
Calabria
Calabria is a Regions of Italy, region in Southern Italy. It is a peninsula bordered by the region Basilicata to the north, the Ionian Sea to the east, the Strait of Messina to the southwest, which separates it from Sicily, and the Tyrrhenian S ...
and
Campania
Campania is an administrative Regions of Italy, region of Italy located in Southern Italy; most of it is in the south-western portion of the Italian Peninsula (with the Tyrrhenian Sea to its west), but it also includes the small Phlegraean Islan ...
, are derived from it.
In 1991 the total population in Tunisia was reported to be 5 million; in 1992, a population of 50 000 was reported in Algeria. In 2008, the Barbarin constituted about 60% of the overall sheep population in Tunisia, which was estimated to count approximately 4 million ewes.
Characteristics
The Barbarin is a coarse-wool breed, and is reared mainly for meat. It is particularly well adapted to the intense heat of desert areas, and can tolerate
brackish
Brackish water, sometimes termed brack water, is water occurring in a natural environment that has more salinity than freshwater, but not as much as seawater. It may result from mixing seawater (salt water) and fresh water together, as in estuari ...
water. The coat is white, and the face is either brick-red or black. The black face gives the animal better resistance to sunlight and to
photosensitivity Photosensitivity is the amount to which an object reacts upon receiving photons, especially visible light. In medicine, the term is principally used for abnormal reactions of the skin, and two types are distinguished, photoallergy and phototoxicit ...
caused by eating ''
Hypericum perforatum
''Hypericum perforatum'', commonly known as St. John's wort (sometimes perforate St. John's wort or common St. John's wort), is a flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae. It is a hairless, Perennial, perennial herb with woody Root, roots, y ...
'', "St. John's Wort".
Apart from the two principal types, a further eight sub-populations have been identified within the breed. These include an all-black variant, and two "spectacled" sub-types with a white head and patches of colour only around the eyes and round the muzzle: the black-spectacled type is called ''sardi'', and the red-spectacled one, ''sagaa''.
References
Sheep breeds originating in Tunisia
{{Sheep-stub