Who Will Lead?
May 2nd, 2014 · No Comments · Posted in farming
Lambing has thrown our routine out of whack in more ways than one.
I’m trying to move the recently shorn sheep out of the permanent paddock and onto spring pasture but they won’t follow the way they used to. We open the paddock gate and instead of being lead to the pasture enclosure behind a grain bucket they just wander off in all directions. Without a sheep dog, we wear ourselves ragged trying to move them in the right direction and finally give up when we just manage to get them back in the paddock.
What could account for this unwelcome change in behavior?
Something has definitely changed. The flock has lost its leaders. It finally dawned on me that the two alpha sheep in the group–Charlotte and Hannah–are both confined to the maternity ward. Without them charging after the grain bucket, the others sheep don’t know who to follow or what to do. They act like they’ve never seen a grain bucket before.
As an experiment, I released Charlotte from the maternity side of the paddock. She didn’t need any extra encouragement. As soon as she saw the bucket I was carrying, she came running. And she hugged my hip all the way out to the pasture where I have the cow, the boy goat and a couple of the other sheep grazing. I opened the fencing and Charlotte followed me right inside. She had only one thing in mind: getting her head inside that grain bucket.
Here’s my dilemma: I now have a flock split in half. Actually, it’s split in three parts, with one in the maternity ward, two ewes with ram in the permanent paddock and everybody else–including the pregnant Charlotte–out on pasture. Somehow I need to move those uncooperative ewes to join the group on pasture, and get Charlotte back in a place where she can lamb undisturbed. In the absence of a magic wand, I’m starting to think the next move could involve a truck.
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