DORPER BREED
Dorper breed
The Dorper is a white, non-woolled, sheep and over time the breed has developed two variants: the Dorper - which has a black head and black pigment on the reproductive tract - and the White Dorper which is completely white. It is a medium sized sheep, rams weighing 90-105 kg and ewes 70-95 kg, with a height of 60 cm with stocky short legs. The Dorper is nowadays mostly used for its meat.
The Dorper has a light-colored coat, with short hairs, little wool and a thin skin. It is a wool shredder and therefore does not have to be sheared. The average production is 0.66 kg of greasy wool per year with a clean yield of 64.5 percent, which is very low compared to 5.1 kg of greasy wool production from the wool led Merino breed.
THE DORPER HAS A LIGHT-COLORED
COAT, WITH SHORT HAIRS, LITTLE WOOL, AND A THIN SKIN
SHEEP AND LAMB
The Dorper has an a-seasonal breeding cycle, which makes an accelerated lambing system – lambing 3 times in 2 years - possible under intensive conditions. Their fertility rate is high and the average litter size of 1.4 lambs is a little lower than that of other breeds. Litter size increases with parity until the age of five.
The lambs weigh between 2.4 and 4.25 kg - on average 3.98 kg - at birth, grow between 0.24-0.28 kg daily and reach the weight of 25.56 kg on average when they are 100 days old. The Dorper is thus able to grow fast but is also likely to put on fat early in life. This is the reason that Dorpers are slaughtered early in life to avoid fat structures
