Lambs

Because Gracie needed a job.....

Notice the little guy in the background with the brown patch

Love the look on the sheep's face. "Really? Right now you want to eat?"

When Gracie was about 8 months old, I hired a dog trainer who came to the house every week. He told me that Australian Shepherds need to be worked. They need a job. Now that job could be agility or obedience training on a regular basis, rescue work if they have a good enough nose (she does), or herding. When I heard about herding being within an hour of where I live and reasonable in price, I chose that endeavor.

I must have been nuts. I have hit the ground at least 18 times in the past 18 months. This past Sunday I tripped in the pasture, went down, and my darling little Aussie drove the herd around me. Have you ever tried to get up off the ground with sheep crowding you, the entire time being noisy as well? "BAAAAAAAAAAA!"

The one aspect of sheep herding that bothers me is the exposure to different attitudes towards animals. I fully realize that farmers can't get attached to farm animals. The sheep, cattle, llama, and herd guard dogs are workers, not hairy kids that sleep with you at night. Logically I know that. But it breaks my heart when you encounter a lamb that you know is not going to make it. Look at the little guy in the second photograph, with the one brown patch on his left hind quarter. He also is tinged in brown on the very edges of his ears. This lamb is about 2 1/2 weeks old. For whatever reason, he lost his mom in the herd. Or she has abandoned him. But he was staggering around last Sunday, so Leah decided to give him some liquid vitamins and a bottle. To do that, I had to help. I held that guy in my arms, talking in a low, soothing voice, and helped feed him.

When a sheep lays down on the ground all the way on their side, they are probably going to die. I don't know why, I just know this is what they see at the farm. This cute little one laid all the way down several times while I was there on Sunday. Jim, the farm owner, finally picked him up and took him in, hoping that a little TLC would get him back on his feet.

Sometimes shit happens. There isn't a whole lot you can do about it. But it still bothers me. There were 30 lambs born this spring. Leah changed the feed for the herd, so there was only one single birth, the majority twins, and two or three sheep had triplets. I'd like to see all of them make it, but one little one died about 6 hours after being born, and one sheep passed leaving her lamb motherless within hours after birth.

I could not be a farmer. I'd be crying all day long. Have a good one today. Be grateful.
Linda