What do you do when the survival strategy you've been using no longer works?
When I watch the various animals out here at the ranch I can clearly see how evolution has shaped their instincts for survival. At the first hint of danger -- whether a lurking puma or a flapping shopping bag -- those things can asphyxiate you if you're not careful! -- horses are built for fear and speed, with fast legs and big hearts. Eternal vigilance and a willingness to flee have served them well, and they're still ever-watchful here.
The donkeys went down a more aggressive path, facing directly into danger, finding safety in numbers not through the sacrifice of the less-fleet but in the power of multiple striking hooves. When the dogs get after them, the donkeys turn and fight.
The sheep, on the other hand, settled on screwing their way out of trouble. Not at the deciding moment, of course, but rather they breed rapidly enough that they could travel in massive flocks. They huddle together for safety, ensuring that only the ones on the outside get eaten. I'm not exactly sure how they decide who gets "Outside the Circle of Trust" duty, but I would guess it involves those poor individuals who insist on chasing an inside straight to the river.
On our ranch we only have four sheep, and yet they cling to their instinctual method of survival even so. Rarely more than a few feet from each other, they still clump into a ball when danger threatens. Of course with only four of them, they fail to realize that they're ALL on the outside of the flock, putting them equally at risk of being dinner.
You can look at their insistence on the old ways as either an honorable and commendable adherence to proven tradition, or as a hopelessly hidebound reliance on a now-irrelevant custom.
So what do you do when the survival strategy you've been depending on no longer works? I'm not sure, personally, but I plan on keeping an eye on those sheep just in case they hit on something new.
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Survival Strategies
Monday, May 21, 2007
Baby Got Back
I knew I had returned to Nerd Country from New York City when I had my head almost shoved into a sheep's butt while shearing it.
Not 24 hours earlier I'd been breakfasting in a chic NYC deli on Broadway (scrambled eggs with tomato and salmon on foccacia bread, thank you very much), and yet at 10:00 on Saturday morning I found myself wrestling with Chubby the sheep. (The juvenile among you can now insert your own "Jeff got a Chubby while messing with his sheep" joke here. There now, feel better? Good.) His coat had not been sheared the year before, and it had gotten to truly Bob Marley-esque proportions, looking like some dreadlock-ridden Bubba Gone Wild. He was miserable in the heat, and the brutal 100-degree stretch hadn't even started yet.
So Annie got on Craig's List and put out a call for anyone willing to come teach us how to fleece a sheep. Taylor, a local high school student, answered and agreed to come out. Miraculously, Annie had a horse clinic to attend on the appointed day, leaving yours truly on sheep-wrangling duty. Luckily Chubby is pretty friendly, so between Taylor, her mom, and me we got him haltered and tied to a post in the barn.
Now, for the record, sheep don't much like being sheared. I can't blame them, the electric blades are kind of loud, and being tied up without a "safe word" isn't much fun. Plus, you know, sheep are pretty much born looking for a place to die, so they're scared of most anything. I don't believe electric shears resemble a cougar, but you never know what the world looks like to an herbivore.
Taylor brought three sets of shears, which is good because they get overheated very quickly, especially with a coat as thick as Chubby's. After three hours we had him mostly done, leaving just the neck and his belly for comfort while lying down. I got the privilege of doing his rear end, as I mentioned earlier, and believe me, there are few things more fun than holding down a sheep while trying to apply a buzzing, clacking, black set of shears to his holiest of holies. I'm pretty sure I need to go to confession now.
Anyway, since Chubby was done we had a choice -- call it a day or go for the Twin who had a pretty thick coat of its own. I say "its own" because, frankly, I don't know how to sex a sheep. (Yes yes, "Get it on the fence first," very funny. Go away.) Whatever its gender, the Twin had about half its fleece still stubbornly clinging on, and being a guy I said, "Well, we're here anyway, might as well give it a shot."
Ten minutes later, as I flung myself bodily through the air and landed with a thud on the Twin while it desperately tried to escape, my glasses crushed somewhere in the poop-laden pasture, I started rethinking my sticktoitiveness. Taylor gamely slipped the halter on, but as soon as I got to my feet, off ran the Twin.
Ten minutes after THAT, I finally gave up. One more flying tackle let us get the halter off, and for all I care the Twin can sweat to death. At least this time I didn't pull a muscle chasing livestock around the place. They say sheep aren't very bright, but last I checked, I was the one with broken glasses, skinned arms, and a face full of butt-wool while the sheep were contentedly grazing.
Just another day in Nerd Country, miles -- and worlds -- away from New York City. It's good to be back.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Chubby, Dirty, and the Twins
While "Chubby, Dirty, and the Twins" sounds like a brief version of my dating history, in fact it refers to the newest residents at Shiloh Falls -- our four sheep. 
Why do we have sheep, you might ask? Well, you see, the border collies were getting bored and ... yes, we bought pets for our pets. No one ever said we were sane.
We do have somewhat more rational (or less insane, which is sort of the same thing) reasons for getting sheep, of course. First, there's all the money you save on gas for a tractor or lawnmower, and with the price of oil going up I feel pretty good about that.
Then there's all the cotton they give off, which as Annie assured me we can turn into nice clothing.
But the real reason is, sadly, that the border collies were bored. They get such a kick out of "herding" the donkeys and horses from behind the fence that we thought it would be a good idea to train them to herd for real. Unfortunately that's hard to do without actual, you know, sheep. So we got some. The plan now is for Annie to attend a couple of clinics or training classes to get the basics, then to take a try at teaching the borders how they roll on the Scottish highlands. Even now I can imagine my first kilt fitting.
She already knows a couple of things, and has taken the dogs one at a time into the sheep pen on a leash. The best part of teaching (or "starting" if you want the cool "in" term, just in case you ever find yourself in an awkward conversation with a real shepherd, which I know happens to me all the time) a new dog how to herd is that you get to carry a big ol' staff with you the whole time. I used to think this was just so shepherds would look more picturesque, but in reality it's used to whack the dogs in the head if they try to bite.
No, really -- it's a dog-whacking stick. How cool is that?!
Both of the borders did pretty well, after getting over their abject sheep terror once they were on the business side of the fence. The sheep weren't quite so sanguine about the entire experience, but they came through it like the pros they are.
See, it turns out there are different kinds of sheep for herding. When your dogs are just starting, like ours are, you want "knee-knocker" sheep, which means they've been trained to come to a human when dogs chase them. That's important, because if the new pup gets too aggressive and tries to bite (a very bad habit to let a herding dog get into) you have to be able to whack them with the stick, and you can't do that if the sheep are fleeing at a high rate of speed away from you.
Like I said, so far it's going well. The sheep are taking to their new pen, and the dogs are ecstatic to have something they can actually herd. Me? I've gotten Dirty with Chubby and the Twins, and what red-blooded American bubba can't get excited about that?
