There comes a time in every shepherd’s life when enough is enough. Or at least in my life there came a time. It was moving day. No, not for us, for the sheep. Time to put on mood music and light scented candles so the boys and girls are amorous.
For the most part, our sheep are bucket trained and move fairly well. Today was exceptional. First the Finns in with their ram Yanis. Flawless. The girls went in, no one, including the cow got out. Next, the Icelandics to Oden’s pen. I was nervous on this one-the gate is terrible and we have a large wether in that pen who likes to escape-and he is big enough to make it happen. But no, easy. All in, no one out.
The last move should be easy. Move 4 ewes a total of 15 feet, from one pen to the next. Challenges arose, however. Not all the ewes in the pen were moving-too old, too recently lambed, too young, etc. Adding to the issue was the fact this was our rescue pen. Our very jumpy girls we rescued almost two years ago. They don’t mind us coming around, but they know when something is up, and they will make everyone start running circles. Not sure how many of you have ever tried to catch a sheep, running in a group, in a circle, in a square pen. It sounds simple??
Our plan was to fool the girls. Dump grain in their feeder, sneak up behind, grab who I need. Molly would open the gate, out comes the sheep. When all 5 were out, bucket them to the new pen.
Mostly, the plan was executed with precision. Except Rosa. Rosa will come to peanuts, let us scratch under her chin when we sit in the pen; she is an easy going girl. Until today. She wanted nothing to do with us, the grain, the plan. She immediately moved to the other side of the pen, pulling a few nervous rescue ewes with her. No amount of coaxing, graining, peanuting would do. She was not leaving that pen. So we let her stay. Sometimes sheep are subtle in their signals, other times they are very clear.
Now 3 Shetland ewes are outside the pen. Munching on hay, sniffing other sheep, having a grand ole time. Now a few bucket shakes and they can meet Grayson, their soon to be baby daddy.
These 4 ewes: Ginny, Jane, George are also very docile (Literary sidenote-Virginia Woolf, Jane Austen, George Eliot. #whenEnglishteachersareshepherds). George is a milk producer, very used to having us put hands on her. Ginny and Jane have never balked at the bucket or any other treat. So here we go. In goes George, in goes Jane. Right past the gate goes Ginny.
I could, if I were so inclined, and I thought readers would want me to, detail the next 45 minutes. Frankly, Molly and I look pretty dumb. Ginny looks like the craftiest animal on earth. We won, of course. The scene was YouTube worthy-pinning the ewe in an alley between pens as my NotAShepherd son and his NotAShepherdess girlfriend helped us trap her. She joined the group, happily munching on hay like we hadn’t just threatened to butcher her on the spot (we were kidding of course, mostly).
Up to this point, we had discussed buying a herding dog. We love dogs, we saw a slight need; it would happen someday. As a side note, we already have 5 dogs, perhaps that was the driving decision maker. Until Ginny. Until 45 minutes. Until we had almost divorced over strategies to catch 1 sheep.
Introducing Lumi. An Australian Shepherd, Border Collie mix. Coincidentally, I had just sold three sheep. Coincidentally those three sheep paid for the puppy. Coincidence? Fate. We shall see.