Sheepdogs on Britain’s Hills

By “Awake!” Correspondent In The British Isles

IN THESE modern times when machines have made many traditional methods of farming obsolete, has the sheepdog gone the way of the workhorse? Can some efficient machine do the job better than a dog? Who can answer with greater authority than the shepherds?

One British shepherd now works his farm single-handedly with the help of one dog, whereas three men worked full time previously to run the same farm. A writer on hill farming says that 20 athletes could be sent out early in the morning to gather sheep and could not accomplish before nightfall what one well-trained dog could do. The book “I Bought a Mountain” says: “Hill land would be valueless but for the dogs . . . I do not suppose a couple of hundred men could gather Dyffryn mountain [in Wales] unaided. Thirteen men can manage with dogs.”

Much depends on the type of country being farmed. But, whatever the terrain, shepherds agree that the well-trained sheepdog is far from becoming obsolete.

The sheepdog plays a part in many facets of sheep farming. It is invaluable at shearing and dipping times, for singling out a specific sheep for marking or injecting, for “shedding” (that is, separating certain sheep from the rest) and for ‘mothering on.’ The latter term is used to describe getting a ewe to foster a lamb that is not hers. To do this, the shepherd sets the dog to watch a chosen ewe. This action arouses her mothering instinct and, as she stamps at the dog, the young lamb takes the opportunity to suckle, the ewe forgetting it is not her own.

Dogs have been especially valuable in finding sheep lost deep in snowdrifts. In Derbyshire, England, during a particularly bad winter a sheep farmer lost over 700 sheep. But his dog managed to find about 500 of them, locating three of the sheep buried seven feet (2 m) under snow that was frozen solid as rock. They had been buried for more than eight weeks and, to stay alive, had eaten all the wool from each other’s backs.

For faithfulness and endurance, surely the story of Tip cannot be beaten. During the hard winter of 1953 in the Peak District of Derbyshire, Tip went out in the snow with her master, but neither of them returned. Search parties finally gave up all hope. Fifteen weeks later, when shepherds were gathering sheep far afield, his dead body was found with the emaciated Tip still alive by his side. Her master apparently having collapsed from exhaustion, Tip had refused to leave him.

Obedience is well illustrated by the story of Jed. One day her master was shepherding with her and two young puppies he was training. He sent Jed across the moor, directing her to bring some sheep to a nearby gate. While Jed went about her duties, the puppies suddenly dashed into the path of an oncoming truck. The shepherd saved the dogs but was knocked unconscious and was taken to a hospital, where later he died. This occurred about two o’clock in the afternoon. In the confusion the dogs were forgotten until about five o’clock, when the shepherd’s son asked about them. He found that the puppies had been taken into a nearby inn. And Jed? She was found with the sheep, waiting for her master to open the gate.

Twentieth-century shepherds live in the Space Age. Nevertheless, they rightly value their dogs, just as did the Bible patriarch Job, who spoke highly of the ‘dogs of his flock.’​—Job 30:1.