Ok, That Was Strange

I hope each of you had a wonderful and Blessed Christmas, and it was everything you desired!

I learned a long time ago that watching your animal’s behavior can show you much you would not normally see, hear, smell, or learn.

Horses are excellent at watching their domain. If something is wrong, or conversely, ok, they will let you know immediately. Their unique ears pick up such minute sounds I know I miss. It’s pretty cool that one ear can listen to the front and one to the back at the same time. Same thing with their eyes, and they sure don’t miss much. Mother nature and survival instinct created an amazing evolutionary design!

Cows, very similar, but they have more of a curiosity aspect to their mentality. It can often lead them into a dangerous situation.

I often imagine this scenario with cows.

“Gee, who is that? Is that a wolf? Let’s go check it out. Naw, it won’t hurt us, we are good cows. Hey, he brought friends. I bet we can be friends with them. Oh, look, my baby is going up to them. Wait a minute, there are lots more. Oh, now they are growling at us. Hey baby, come back here something is wrong. DAMN…RUN!!!”

Dogs, well that’s self-explanatory.

Sheep, well, sheep are kinda like cows, but they are much more willing to run if something spooks them. And they run as a flock. Sometimes I think they have a telepathy thing going on. Or they are just really good copycats.

It’s quite funny to watch a flock move past a person, and the person sticks a leg out, thus the closest sheep jumps over the leg. Every sheep behind them will jump at the exact same spot, even when the leg is not there now.

Telepathy or copy? Only you can decide.

This morning, I’m out doing chores in the cold and snow. For reference, there is a blizzard raging to the east of us, and they think it could back up to my area. Ugh.

Got the barn sheeps fed and broke their water. Lucy is doing good in the barn for now, it’s much easier for her not to slip in the snow and ice. Tally is glad to have a buddy again. Fed Brandy horse her grain. Broke water on one stock tank and changed the heater extension cord over so it can start to melt that one down. I can only run one at a time or I blow fuses. And the house wolf and I went for a walk today. The 4 wheeler is not liking the cold at the moment.

We did a loop up the hill, across the upper meadow and back down the south power line, past the bale feeder and back to the barn. It was a nice walk, warmer out than I anticipated so I played a bit of hide and seek with the house wolf. He was having a ball sniffing every tree out there and then running back to find me.

Went to let the sheep out for the day from the corral and for some reason they did something I’ve not seen them do before.

Halfway between the corral and the bale feeder there is a smallish tree growing. The sheep walked as far as the tree and made a U turn en masse and trotted back towards the barn.

Huh?

I took a look at Brandy who was near the barn, but she was calm and quiet, head slightly down, ears in a normal horsey position. In other words, she was not alert to some hidden danger.

Corral dogs were not blowing up but eating their breakfast, without a care in the world.

Just the sheep were being odd.

Now, while I was out with the house wolf, I did see a herd of deer off the south fence line, moving southeast together. By the time the sheep were let out, they would have been far enough away that the sheep should not have seen or heard them.

Of course, that does not mean that the bobcat in the area was not up in a tree near the bale feeder, and I just happened to walk under it without even noticing it there.

Isn’t that a comforting thought?

I kept scanning the tree line for whatever perceived threat the sheep decided was there. I saw a few birds, a rabbit and nothing else.

Once the dogs were done with their breakfast, I threw hay in for the naughty bunch that I always have to put back in, so they don’t do a walkabout. I kept waiting for the bulk of the flock to move back to the bale feeder, but instead they kept crowding by the barn.

Ok, then. Maybe there is something out there that the dogs, Brandy and I can’t see. I erred on the side of caution and let the flock back into the corral for now. They tore into the hay I pitched, which leads me to believe they were hungry, and something really had them tweaked if they are not going for their free choice food.

Maybe there was a bobcat lurking, waiting for an opportunity to drop out of a tree on a sheep. Maybe that’s why the deer were moving away. Maybe a lone coyote was on the move, and they caught its scent. Maybe last year’s mountain lion has returned.

Or maybe those sheep were just playing me for an easy meal because it’s so hard to walk up the hill and put their heads in the feeder.

I would not put it past them to have gotten together and made a plan to throw me off.

I must say, they succeeded!! Silly buggers!

Blessed Be!

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