Table 1.

Description of phenotypic characteristics and environmental variables of three sheep breeds sampled in this study.

	Large-Tailed Han Sheep	Altay Sheep	Tibetan Sheep
Tail type	Long fat-tail	Fat-rumped	Long short-tail
No. individual	40	40	40
Body weight (average kg)	70.4 kg in male and 60.2 kg in female	98.3 kg in male and 77.1 kg in female	51 kg in male and 43.6 kg in female
Coat color	White	Brown	White body, heads and feet in miscellaneous colors
Horn	Most males have spiral horns and most females have ginger-shaped horns	Males have large horns, most females have horns	Males have large horns, females have horns
Region	Liaocheng county, Shan Dong Province	Fuhai county, Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region	Tianzhu county, Gansu Province
Geographical coordinates	N35°47′–37°02’ and E115°16´–116°32´	N40°00´–48°10´ and E87 °00´–89°04´	N36°31´–37°55´and E102 °07´–103°46´
Climate	Warm temperate continental monsoon climate	Continental arid climate	Continental plateau monsoon climate
Altitude (m)	22–49	386–3332	2040–4874
Temperature(°C)	−22.3–41.8	−42.7–40	−8–4
Use	Meat-fat dual type	Meat-fat dual and coarse wool type	Coarse wool type

Note: The data were derived from animal genetic resources in China for sheep and goats [2].