How to Read the USDA Sheep and Goats Report — Inventories, Lamb Crop, Wool, Mohair and Revision Error

As of 4 November 2026, 00:41 KST; most recently published report: Sheep and Goats from the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), with January 1, 2026 inventories and 2025 lamb crop, kid crop, wool, mohair, slaughter and death loss. The publication listing confirms the January 30, 2026 release; the NASS release-day page lists the same date; the publication page lists the report as annual, and the publication listing displayed no next release date when checked at 00:41 KST; the sources used give no time of day. Primary source: https://esmis.nal.usda.gov/sites/default/release-files/795751/shep0126.txt^[1][2][3]

Comparison basis: in the table above, the sheep and lamb rows are in thousands of head with one decimal, the goat rows in head, and the wool rows in thousands of pounds or thousands of dollars, as labelled in each row. The text gives whole-percentage changes and the tables print the current year as a percent of the previous year; this page's calculated changes for the selected rows are rounded half up to one decimal, so for example all goats show +0.6% calculated against "up 1 percent" in the text. The 2025 levels are as printed in this report after its revisions. The report, publication page and release-day page are all from USDA and count as one source.^[1]

In three lines

1. The annual NASS Sheep and Goats report gives January 1 inventories by class, the previous year's lamb and kid crops, wool and mohair output, and sheep death loss.
2. U.S. sheep and lambs totaled 4.99 million head on January 1, 2026 (down 1%), and all goats and kids 2.51 million (up 1%).
3. Wool production fell 5% to 20.5 million pounds in 2025, and its value fell 7%.^[1]

"All sheep and lambs inventory in the United States on January 1, 2026 totaled 4.99 million head, down 1 percent from 2025." "Market lambs comprised 94 percent of the total market inventory." "The 2025 lamb crop of 3.03 million head was down slightly from 2024." "The 2025 lambing rate was 105 lambs per 100 ewes one year old and older on January 1, 2025, down 1 percent from 2024." "Shorn wool production in the United States during 2025 was 20.5 million pounds, down 5 percent from 2024." "As of January 1, 2026, 28 percent of the total sheep and lambs were hair sheep or wool hair crosses."^[1]

"All goats and kids inventory in the United States on January 1, 2026 totaled 2.51 million head, up 1 percent from 2025." "Meat and all other goats totaled 2.01 million head on January 1, 2026, up 2 percent from 2025." "Mohair price was $6.40 per pound with a value of 2.75 million dollars."^[1]

Definitions. "Lamb crop is defined as lambs born in the Eastern States and lambs docked or branded in the Western States." "Kid crop refers to kids born the previous year." For wool and mohair value: "Production multiplied by marketing year average price." "United States value is the summation of State values."^[1]

Value vs price times production. Wool value is production times the marketing year average price, summed over states, so the U.S. price times U.S. production need not reproduce the published U.S. value exactly: 20,500 thousand pounds times $1.40 gives $28,700 thousand against the published $28,714 thousand, and for mohair 430 thousand pounds times $6.40 gives $2,752 thousand against $2,754 thousand (this page's calculations).^[1]

Percent vs per-100 rates. The lambing rate fell from 106 to 105 lambs per 100 ewes, which the text describes as down 1 percent; it is a change of 1 lamb per 100 ewes. Lamb crop is counted differently by region (born in the East, docked or branded in the West), per the report's definition.^[1]

Inventory classes vs totals. Market lambs were 1,300 of 1,380 thousand market sheep and lambs, 94.2% (this page's calculation; the text says 94 percent). Texas held 760,000 of the 2,005,000 meat and other goats, 37.9% (this page's calculation). Several states' market lamb weight groups are withheld (D) and included in Other States, so state detail is partial.^[1]

Sampling error vs revision error. "Since all operations raising sheep and goats are not included in the sample, survey estimates are subject to sampling variability." For all sheep and lambs the report gives a root mean square error of 0.9 percent, based on differences between first and latest estimates over the past 10 years: "This means that chances are 2 out of 3 that the final estimate will not be above or below the current estimate of 4.99 million head by more than 0.9 percent." "Chances are 9 out of 10 that the difference will not exceed 1.6 percent." "The initial inventory estimate of All Sheep and Lambs has been below the latest estimate 3 times and above the latest estimate 2 times in the last 10 years." The two counts cover 5 of the 10 years; the smallest difference shown is 0, and in this report the remaining years are not described separately. These figures describe past revisions of the selected sheep items only; for goats, no such measure is provided in this report, and none of these is a significance test of the change from 2025.^[1]

Revisions. "All sheep and goats inventory and lamb and kid crop estimates for January 1, 2025, were reviewed using official slaughter, import and export data, and the relationship of new survey information to the prior surveys." About 24,000 producers were contacted in the first half of January, and 44 percent of the reports were usable, per the methodology.^[1]