Why do sheep need so much help?

[SleepingStandingUp]

Farmers always have to be there to look after them, seemingly more so for other animals (based on watching Down on the Farm) but why? Is it how they've been bred? Do they all need the same help really but it isn't talked about? Have cows and pigs got better PR? What would the death rate be like if all the sheep were left to give birth alone?

I'm not Ewe shaming, we should all be entitled to a little help.

I regularly have to rescue sheep who have got their heads stuck and horns entangled in the stock fencing holes trying to graze the grass (that is identical to the grass growing in their fields!!). Stupid creatures

I always thought sheep were dopey cos they eat too many magic mushrooms 🍄

The Welsh mountain sheep when I was small apparently rolled over the grid.

There's a theory... and I'm not saying it's true, but it's a real scientific theory, that sheep are over-domesticated and that our human interventions have moved their evolutionary development away from self-survival. Evidence suggests that sheep were the second species to be domesticated. Even wild sheep aren't that scary as prey / a food source. So if you're already learning, as the human species, to domesticate something, you'd pick a good food source and something not terribly scary to catch.

And we all probably know what was the first species. Dogs. That helped us hunt and then to manage our other domesticated animals. Horses, cows, pigs etc - if you've ever met the wild versions of those, you'd know why they were well down the list of things you're going to want to domesticate!

I grew up on a farm.

Sheep are incredibly dim. They deserve to be eaten.

This thread has really made me smile. I’ve only ever had cade ( orphan lambs to hand rear ) but even then I’ll always get three cos one was bound to die and I didn’t want the other to be lonely.

honestly, they get up one morning and just decide todays the day they’re gonna die. I’m had roast lamb for my tea tonight. No regrets at all 🐑😀

My neighbours don't spend much time checking on their sheep or else they'd know they keep breaking through the fence into my garden. Harrumph.

They seem to hurt their legs a lot. I saw one with a horribly deformed leg recently that must've been broken and been left to heal wonky.

I've had to re-right a few that laid down in the rain and got waterlogged and stranded. I've never seen that happen to a horse or a cow!!

or else they'd know they keep breaking through the fence into my garden.
The grass is always greener on the other side 😂🐑

It could be worse. We adopted rabbits recently. The rescue lady looked me straight in the eye and said 'if you do not get them to eat the correct amount of long stem fibre within eight hours, it's an emergency'

The list of emergencies was four pages long.

A sheeps goal in life is to either escape or die and they're bloody good at it.

Sheep are hella stupid though, I'm not disputing that.

(TW) The farmer at the end of the road has a ram called Suicide Sam. He's a jumper.

I have known many sheep fall off cliffs. They really are very dim indeed.

Still, good meat and lovely jumpers!

My neighbour has three sheep. They're very clever when it comes to escaping but then once they've managed that its like they've used up all their clever and just stand bleating in the middle of the road looking thoroughly bemused as to how they ended up there.

Lambs always seem brighter than sheep. As though when they're young they have energy and ideas, but then a few months in they wake up and realise, shit, I've turned into a sheep. No wonder they lose the will you live.

Goats otoh...

Shetland sheep are small, wiry and cunning. They appear to be the exception to the suicidal rule, instead being utterly bloody minded and impossible to do much with. To add fun to life, they like cliffs, and don’t seem to fall off them much. Though might get stuck meaning the coastguard gets called out to rescue them. When the coastguard people have hiked for miles to tricky spot, lugging all manner of equipment to go down and get it, the sheep then usually skips gleefully back up the vertical drop and evades capture. If you’ve ever bought a Shetland wool jumper, you’ll know that even their fleece annoys you - itchy itchy scratchy scratchy. I have a sneaking admiration for them, but mostly fume at their existence. Which is exactly what they want I think.

If you find a stuck or upended sheep should you help it out then? I always remember being told not to “interfere”.

One of those that live just across the road from us gets a bucket stuck on its head with monotonous frequency. Cue much frantic baaing and head shaking. It comes off relatively easily ( we can’t just ignore it). Mind, what does it say about the farmer’s intellect that he keeps leaving the bucket in the field?

I've always heard that you should help them, as they can die rather quickly if left.
We once came across a lamb baaing loudly on the path, standing its ground as we approached with our (on lead, obv) dog. We then noticed a sheep on her back nearby. So I sent DH to right it - wasn't hard and it seemed fine, lamb trotted off happily to its mum.

If we hadn't intervened, I'd guess both the sheep and the lamb might have died.

Reminds me of the time I took my daughter to play at a friends' place and turns out they have sheep. Their mum asked one of the boys to go feed Rammy. He did so by hooking the feed bucket over Rammy's horns and leaving him to it.

Having grown up on a farm I am enjoying all the sheep stories but they aren't the only animal to depend on humans for reproduction. There are some breeds of cattle that always need to have a caesarean section. And turkeys apparently struggle to have sex they have been bred so big.

If you see a sheep on her back you need to roll her up again, and watch her for a short while as she might be wobbly. Their fleeces can get waterlogged and then are incredibly heavy. That , plus pregnancy, can make sheep unable to right themselves if they accidentally roll onto their backs. They can die if left.

Are the ones who have learned to eat seaweed any brighter? I can’t help thinking that seaweed sounds a lot more nutritious than grass so could have improved their IQ over the years……

I really want the OP to change the l in their name to an h.

🐑🐏

Over domesticated. It is our fault, basically.
Horses too. They seem to like to die from everything and anything.

They all have different personalities. I love watching the lambs. There's such a difference between the bold ones and the timid ones. When they get in a gang and charge about in circles it's kinda mad.

For several years now it's been the same ewe that breaks into my garden. Most of the others seem content to respect a fence. She's decided that running full pelt, head down until the posts eventually come out of the ground is worth it. My grass is no better than what she already has. She also doesn't care whether her lambs come with her or get abandoned on the other side. Some of them are really attentive mothers. Others, not so much so.