The Booroola is a

Merino The Merino is a breed or group of breeds of domestic sheep, characterised by very fine soft wool. It was established in Spain near the end of the Middle Ages, and was for several centuries kept as a strict Spanish monopoly; exports of the bree ...

strain that has a high rate of multiple births. Booroola's prolificacy was studied extensively by

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

researchers, who provided one of the first examples of the practical application of

gene mapping Gene mapping describes the methods used to identify the locus of a gene and the distances between genes. Gene mapping can also describe the distances between different sites within a gene. The essence of all genome mapping is to place a c ...

in sheep, by mapping the Booroola

gene In biology, the word gene (from , ; "... Wilhelm Johannsen coined the word gene to describe the Mendelian units of heredity..." meaning ''generation'' or ''birth'' or ''gender'') can have several different meanings. The Mendelian gene is a b ...

chromosome A chromosome is a long DNA molecule with part or all of the genetic material of an organism. In most chromosomes the very long thin DNA fibers are coated with packaging proteins; in eukaryotic cells the most important of these proteins are ...

6 .

History

The Booroola Merino was started by Jack and Dick Seears of Booroola,

Cooma Cooma is a town in the south of New South Wales, Australia. It is located south of the national capital, Canberra, via the Monaro Highway. It is also on the Snowy Mountains Highway, connecting Bega with the Riverina. At the , Cooma had a ...

using ewes from their Egelabra flock that gave multiple-births. The Seears gave the CSIRO a

quintuplet A multiple birth is the culmination of one multiple pregnancy, wherein the mother gives birth to two or more babies. A term most applicable to vertebrate species, multiple births occur in most kinds of mammals, with varying frequencies. Such bir ...

ram in 1958, another in 1959 and a

sextuplet A multiple birth is the culmination of one multiple pregnancy, wherein the mother gives birth to two or more babies. A term most applicable to vertebrate species, multiple births occur in most kinds of mammals, with varying frequencies. Such bi ...

ewe in 1960. In 1958, the CSIRO purchased 12 ewes (

triplets A multiple birth is the culmination of one multiple pregnancy, wherein the mother gives birth to two or more babies. A term most applicable to vertebrate species, multiple births occur in most kinds of mammals, with varying frequencies. Such bi ...

quadruplets A multiple birth is the culmination of one multiple pregnancy, wherein the mother gives birth to two or more babies. A term most applicable to vertebrate species, multiple births occur in most kinds of mammals, with varying frequencies. Such bir ...

) and a ewe who had given birth to triplets. When the Booroola flock was dispersed in 1965, the CSIRO purchased 91 mixed-age multiple-born ewes and moved their Booroola flock from

Deniliquin Deniliquin () is a town in the Riverina region of New South Wales, Australia, close to the border with Victoria. It is the largest town in the Edward River Council local government area. Deniliquin is located at the intersection of the Riverina ...

Armidale Armidale is a city in the Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia. Armidale had a population of 24,504 as of June 2018. Estimated resident population, 30 June 2018. It is the administrative centre for the Northern Tablelands region. I ...

. The Egelabra and Mumblebone strains of the

can be traced to Gamboola; these were derived from

Samuel Marsden Samuel Marsden (25 June 1765 – 12 May 1838) was an English-born priest of the Church of England in Australia and a prominent member of the Church Missionary Society, believed to have introduced Christianity to New Zealand. Marsden was a prom ...

's flock, and like Macarther's flock, Marsden's flock was based on South African Escurial, Cape and

Bengal Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...

Sheep. The Bengal was a prolific sheep imported from Calcutta.

History

Notes

References

Further reading