Ram Wrangling

Sometimes, you just grab life by the horns!

Or... you just grab a ram by the horns! Same difference.

Those tricksy rams broke out of their pasture and straight into the ewes' last week. Fencing is like the sheep form of protection, and we farmers are like a Planned Parenthood. We gotta help these kids out, or they'll make mistakes, like lots of unwanted pregnancies and little lambs with with mystery daddies. Due to the busted fence, we were forced to relocate the three rascally rams to a safe, distant location where lady sheep only exist in dreams. Aka the other side of the farm, where multiple gates, fences, and even a barn, will stand between the star-crossed lovers.

But how to do this?

Well, it wasn't easy. It involved lots of running on Michael & Jonathan's part, lots of laughing on my part, and lots of sheep hurtling around like wooly bullets. They may have short legs, but man, those things are fast! There were many close calls, like when Jonathan managed to grab just this much of one ram:

Thankfully, sheep respond to fear by going limp and playing dead. So once they're caught, they're mostly docile. It's a bit hard to maneuver a 60-70 pound ram that's floppy & unresponsive over a fence, into the bed of a pickup truck, out of the truck, and over another fence... but we made do! 

The poor guys. They were holding so still, but when you looked in their eyes, they looked so incredibly terrified. We were all relieved when we dropped them off in their new pasture together and they relaxed again. I'm sure they're devastated to be so far from the ladies, but they'll all get their own breeding groups soon enough!