All Aboard Farm

The Romeldale and California Variegated Mutant (CVM) are  a rare breed of sheep made in America.  The breed is recognized by the American Sheep Industry and the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy.

The Romeldale breed was developed by Mr. A. T. Spencer in 1900's when he purchased and imported several New Zealand Marsh Romney rams to cross in to his flock of Ramboulliet ewes. He wanted to add a longer staple length of wool and improve the carcass quality his sheep. Many years of selection went into the development of the Romeldale breed with special attention to carcass cutabillty, superior to all other white faced sheep and fleece quality to include an extremely high yield, uniform from britch to neck, with a spinning grade in the 60's-64's.

In the 1960's Mr. Glen Eidman, a partner of Mr. J. K. Sexton, found in his purebred Romeldale flock a multi-colored ewe lamb, which he choose to keep in his flock. A few years later a ram lamb was produced with a similar color and same pattern. When bred together they created more of the same mutations with in the Romeldale flock and the "California Variegated Mutant" or "CVM" was born. Mr. Eidman spent the next 15 years improving the CVM's with in his flock by breeding the best to the best and not selling replacement ewes or rams. During that time he placed special emphasis on the spinnability of the fleece, twining and ease at lambing.

In the early 1980's Mr. Eidman's flock of about 75 CVM's were totally dispersed and sold to dozens of flock owners in the state of California. Many of the Eidman CVM's ended up in cross breeding situations bred to Polypays, Lincoln, Ramboulliets and Suffolk's producing outstanding market lambs. But, there were a few flock owners that chose to keep their flocks pure.

In the 1990's, The American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (ALBC) added the Romeldale and CVM to it's conservation list. At the present time the ALBC lists them both as "Critical" which means fewer than 200 annual registrations in the United States and estimated global population less than 2000.