Projected climate change will involve an additional threat for the sustainability of small
ruminant production systems in Europe. Aiming to understand its implications, we conducted
a literature review on climate change interactions with sheep and goat systems. The review
first identifies the main potential impacts on productivity at the animal level (heat stress
effects) and at the forage level (quantity and quality). Results from analysed studies suggest
that heat stress thresholds for small ruminants could be higher than previously indicated …