sheepoverboard.com

So, Can Sheep Swim?

That our ovine friends might sink like a lanolin brick is an unhappy possibility.

Take a splash wearing 10 pounds-weight of soaked wool with just hooves for paddling and see how well you fare.

Images at right: By Turkadactyl, from his YouTube video - see below.

As do greased bird feathers, the oily fibres slowly waterlog and floatation must increasingly rely on forward motion.

Fatigue from strong currents or ocean waves would eventually doom our hapless, incongruously-placed cousin.

Though able to instinctively handle flooding and rivers, it is not their element, and animal rescuers report seeing them stuck upside-down struggling, or drowned.

The tale of our beloved “Sheep Overboard” signage starts 4 centuries ago and involves one Samuel de Champlain, of Quebec City fame, and lovingly coined “Father of New France.”

His derring-do, like all great white heroes of that era, might be condense to ignoble exploits thus:

Champlain fired his arquebus and killed 2 of them (Iroquois chieftains) with one shot. One of his men killed the third. The Iroquois turned and fled. This was to set the tone for French-Iroquois relations for the next one hundred years.

Champlain, and fellow thieves de Monts and Dugua, were perusing the coast of Nova Scotia seeking to purloin chunks of native title in the name of France, God, and Greed, when legend has it the sheep became excited at the sight of land, leaping overboard and swimming to what is now named Port Mouton, Nova Scotia.

More seasoned hands among us cynicaly reckon the sheep’s enthusiasm for the deep six resided in sore crutches from their two-legged colleagues’ relentless carnal appetite. Or not.

So, can sheep truly swim?

The argument is moot, dear ovinophiles, as Mr. and Ms. Turkadactyl, God bless their sheep-lovin’ hearts, offer video evidence to put the mess of innuendo and urban legend - passing for informed comment on the Internet regarding this contentious improbability - resoundingly down.

From the man who is a cross between a pterodactyl and a turkey, who has literally tried (with video proof) to stare down a sheep Crocodile Dundee-style, comes this fortuitous and delightful video of Peter, an intrepid but distressed Scottish Blackface sheep who - after his bellowing failed to bring opposite shores together - decided to swim back to his mum, a furious 2-minute sheep paddle across the Loch.

One has the fear, watching, that he might tire and float away. As minutes elapse Peter’s head seems to sink, and one has the fleeting horror his unlikely floatational speed-walking cannot be sustained.

The significance of this recording is that Peter evaluated the considerable (and unknown) risk, judged it do-able, then chose to leap and swim. Unlike, I assume, the creatures below which have been cajoled by humans into a herdlike habit.

Image above: Of course they can swim - every farmer know it.  From Abdul Sayed’s wonderful YouTube collection.

Turkadactyl joins the ranks of esteemed ovine sociologists with his suite of 32 videos, including the invaluable sheep chewing, Pterodactyl encounter and retaliation, sneaking up on sheep, teasing sheep, and interviewing sheep. These he recorded on Island of Mull, Scotland, at the Camas Centre.