BY CHARLES FARROW
A Country Squire’s Guide to the Incomprehensible Stupidity of the Incomer
Let me get this straight. They move out from London—Islington, usually, or that bit of Clapham where the sourdough costs more than a good collie—and within a fortnight they’ve got the RSPCA on speed dial and a Facebook post accusing us landowners of “livestock negligence.” The cheek. The absolute bleeding cheek. I’ve had sheep in this valley since before the Normans arrived. My great-great-great-great-great-grandfather was trampled by a Hereford while waving a pike at Cromwell.
We do not, as a family, neglect animals. We merely fail to dress them in jaunty little waistcoats for the entertainment of passing joggers.
Earlier this year, I had to entertain a young lady from the RSPCA—very polite, looked terribly embarrassed—because someone had reported “a dog locked in a moving prison.” That dog was Meg. My sheepdog. Working. In the Land Rover. With the window down and her tongue flapping like a windsock in a gale. She was not “imprisoned.” She was in transit. There is a difference, you cretinous turnip. The comments section of our local rag—Devon Live, God help them—is now a veritable Roget’s Thesaurus of rural idiocy, and I have nearly choked on my post-prandial brandy more times than I care to count.
Consider the case of Sophie Bond, who reported a field of calves “without their mum.” They were three large rams, Sophie. Rams. As in male sheep. With horns. And beards. And testicles the size of Christmas puddings. Not a single udder among them. How do you get that wrong? Did you not notice the absence of milk-related apparatus? Did you think they were a support group for bereaved dairy calves? Honestly, I’d have more luck teaching my tractor to knit. Then there was Mary Sladden Smith, wailing about a “dead cow” spotted in a field, with the RSPCA rushing over sirens blazing, only to discover it was a black-and-white pony having a nap. The beast was so offended by being woken up that it bit the inspector. Good for it. That pony has more sense than the entire planning committee of the local parish council. If you cannot tell the difference between a deceased bovine and a sleeping equine, you should not be allowed outdoors without a map, a chaperone, and a very large label around your neck reading “CAUTION: EASILY CONFUSED BY WEATHER.”
The horsewomen among us fare no better. Julie Harwood, a horsewoman, was reported for leaving “thick coats” on her horses during a heatwave. They were fly sheets, you utter spoon. Mesh. Airy. Designed to stop the wretched flies from turning the horses’ eyes into jam. They are lighter than a linen shirt. Meanwhile, the woman who reported her—let’s call her “Karen from the new estate”—was walking her handbag dog in a tweed jacket with brass buttons. The hypocrisy is so thick you could stand a pitchfork in it. And Jennifer Nicholson’s father—a man who has forgotten more about sheep than you will ever learn—was reported for keeping his flock in a “muddy field with no food.” The food was turnips, you absolute radish. Under the mud. That’s the whole bloody point. Sheep root. They dig. They are basically woolly pigs when turnips are involved. But because the field didn’t look like a Waitrose salad bar, some incomer decided it was a crime scene.
I swear, next time someone tells me my field “looks empty,” I shall invite them to lie down in it and see how long they last before a ewe sits on their head.
Martin Crowley reports a visit from the SSPCA because a lady was “concerned” that some sheep were much smaller than others. They were lambs. Lambs. The small ones. The ones that were born this spring. The big ones are their mothers. This is not advanced biology. This is “My First Farm” stuff. There are children’s board books about this very concept. The woman demanded the lambs be given protein shakes. I am not making that up. Protein shakes. And then there’s the matter of the hugging photograph, that ridiculous media trope of the farmer “cuddling” a lamb, gazing wistfully into the middle distance. Let me tell you what is actually happening in that photograph, had the photographer stayed another three seconds. The sheep is being wrestled into submission. It is about to have a worming drench rammed down its throat, a tag punched through its ear, and its backside inspected for signs of fly strike. The “hug” is a restraint hold. The “tender gaze” is a man trying not to get kicked in the groin.
But no. The townies see Babe and think we spend our days singing to our animals. We do not. We spend our days fixing fences in the rain and cursing the marts.
Look. I am not saying don’t care. I am saying learn the difference between a nap and a fatality. If you see a horse lying down, it is not dead. It is lying down. They do that. They are not robots. If you see a sheepdog in a vehicle, it is not imprisoned. It is working. It has a better union rep than you do. If you see a field of mud with sheep in it, look closer. There are turnips under there. And if there aren’t, the farmer probably moved them five minutes ago and you just missed the bucket. We are not villains. We are not saints. We are just bloody busy, and we don’t have time to explain to Constable Plod that the “abandoned tractor” is actually parked outside the farmhouse because the farmer is having his tea.
Toodle-pip, and kindly shut the bloody gate.
Charles is a farmer based in the Blackdown Hills.