Sheep farming in Wales

Sheep farms are most often situated in the country's mountains and moorlands, where sheepdogs are employed to round up flocks.

Sheep farming is an ancient husbandry activity in rural parts of Wales where the climate and soil conditions were not suitable for growing crops other than oats.

[4] By the 13th century, sheep farming in Wales had become a major industry and source of income, largely from wool, much of which was exported.

Large flocks of sheep were owned by Cistercian abbeys and monasteries, such as those at Strata Florida, Margam, Basingwerk and Tintern.

]However, large-scale sheep rearing on the higher moors of Wales, such as those in Denbighshire, is only believed to have developed within the last 300 years.

Besides the regular shearing in May or June, the wool was clipped close about the neck and forequarters at Michaelmas, otherwise all of it would have been lost before the following summer in the wanderings of the animal among the thickets and furze in search of food during winter and spring.

On the Gelligaer and Eglwysilan mountains the quality of the wool is fine; but on the hills lying on the western side of the Taff valley it is kempy, which deteriorates its value.

The activities of sheep farming start with growing grass on the meadows, buying hay from external sources and stacking them.

[11] In recent years, sheep farming has become less profitable to the farmers for many reasons including the falling prices of lamb meat, weather conditions, the loss of more than one million breeding ewes between 2001 and 2009 and global warming.

The EU support to the Welsh rural community is reported to be of the order of about half a billion euros a year.

Its role in sustaining rural and upland communities and their position as part of our social and cultural fabric is priceless.

[13] The writer George Monbiot claims that sheep farming practices and grazing prevents natural trees and shrubs from growing and the subsequent fauna associated with such ecosystems flourishing, and that sheep compact the soil contributing to a cycle of flood and drought, thereby restricting the productivity of more fertile lands downstream.

[21] However a 2024 study estimated that although it might be possible to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about a third, sheep farms in total cannot reach net zero without carbon sequestration, for example by growing more trees.

[9] Sheep farming is closely associated with Wales culturally and is often the subject of "lewd jokes and anti-Welsh sentiment" especially by the English.