THE MAKE-UP OF A MOUFLON

By Rickey Hunt

In the world that we live in Make-up is very important to a woman. They say that Make-up enhances their natural beauty. What is Make-up? It is cosmetics that enhance with the aid of adding color. You could say it this way. Color enhances the beauty of a woman. Color also enhances the beauty of a Mouflon ram.

The European Mouflon ram is known as the prettiest of the wild sheep. You take away his color and he looks somewhat plain. Before I married, some of my friends would refer to a woman that did not wear Make-up as a plain-Jane, (Ladies no offense meant). Well the Mouflon ram is the same. Without his color he looks like any other wild sheep with big horns.

Side by side a trophy Rocky Mountain BigHorn pales in comparison with a trophy European Mouflon ram. This is my opinion, but I believe most would agree. What is the difference between the two? It is color!

Over the years the Mouflon sheep have been crossbred with many different types of sheep trying to get a bigger horn. In the process of getting bigger horns much of the splendid color has been lost. Now I am not saying that all mouflons that lack in color are hybrids. Some pure Mouflons do not have much of a saddle. Even some of the early explorers documented that some rams had only a little white. This was only a few! Most of these men stated that the Mouflon ram had a bright white saddle, bright white muzzle, bright white buttocks, bright white belly, and white below their knees. Where they were black it was a slick black. Where they were reddish, most referred to them as having a foxy red color.

Big horns are important to the trophy hunter. Color is also because the Mouflon ram is one of the few exotic trophies that hunters will have a life-sized mount done. Rightly so because the Mouflon ram should be small in body size with big horns and adorned with all of his splendid colors.

What can we do to get color back into our Mouflon herds? Well we must stop breeding just for big horns. Now with the European Mouflon Breeders Association established we have a bigger gene pool to choose from. I believe with in 5 years we will see some of the best Mouflons around. Mouflons that will have small bodies, big horns, and adorned with splendid color.