SURPRISE AT DUSK

The other evening I wanted to move the rams from one of our lower pastures back up to the barn for the night. I normally leave them out at night and they seem to enjoy sleeping under some of the big Doug firs along the fenceline. I had planned to rotate them to a new pasture in the morning so thought I'd just get ahead of the plan a bit. And besides it was a pleasant evening. Our sheep have learned to come to me with a call of "Sheep, sheep, sheep". They know to move away from me with a call of "Up, up, up". This has allowed me to have them follow me or I can herd them from behind the flock depending on the need. No matter which I use, Melody our guard llama seems always to bring up the rear. Of course when she's moving the sheep on her own she pretty much is always in the lead.

So back to the task of moving the rams. I knew they were below a slight hill and out of sight. Rather than hike down the hill to herd them up I called out "Sheep, sheep, sheep" and they soon began their way up the hill toward me at the gate. As I started back to the barn I looked back over my shoulder to make sure all were following and noted the flock had grown by five. Three deer and two barn cats (Barney and Gunther). The deer soon came to the realization that it may not be in their best interest to respond to my voice commands and be following me. It was as if a switch was turned on and over the fence and into the woods they bolted. The cats stayed the course.

I can only attribute this rather strange behavior to the fact that the deer saw that the sheep were very quick to respond to my call and they must have thought the sheep sensed a danger. Because they couldn't sense any danger themselves they figured they would go along with the sheep just in case. Once they realized I was in the lead they decided to return to being deer.