Very worrying.

From Farmer's Weekly:

A new campaign aims to raise awareness among dog owners of the devastating effects of livestock worrying, which is on the rise according to official figures.

The three-month campaign, led by Police Scotland in association with NFU Scotland, Scottish Land & Estates and other authorities, has been launched to coincide with the spring lambing period, when sheep are most at risk...

Dog attacks on livestock: The worrying facts

• More than 18,500 livestock were killed or injured in dog attacks in 2015.

• The South West has the highest number of livestock-worrying incidents in each of the past three years where attacks rose by almost 60% in 2015...

The simplest solution is to put cows and sheep in the same field. If the dogs go after the sheep, the cows will go after the dogs (or their owners).

Sorted.

Idiot Farmer

From The Daily Mail:

Farmers have criticised the BBC programme Countryfile after a report claimed that sheep were to blame for causing flooding. Journalist and environmentalist George Monbiot said on the show:

"Sheep in the hills cause floods in the flood plains. We are very prone to flooding... one of the major reasons is because all the vegetation has been removed and soil compacted by the hooves of the sheep and water just flashes off the pasture."

So it's a bit more nuanced than "blaming sheep", for a start.

He's on to something here, is George, he wrote a lengthy article in The G about it, all makes perfect sense if you gloss over the inevitable references to Climate Change.

Sheep farmer Gareth Wyn Jones, of Llanfairfechan, North Wales, who lost 300 sheep on the hills in last winter’s snow, said he had complained about the programme.

He added: "Farmers are furious with the comments on the programme. The floods can’t be blamed on sheep on the uplands of Wales and elsewhere. I’d like Mr Monbiot to see what the life of an uplands farmer means."

What sort of fucking relevance does that have?

It's like Person A claiming that McDonalds generate too much packaging waste (which might or might not be true) and Idiot Company Director hitting back by saying: "I'd like Person A to see how hard our employees have to work."

Retard, presumed guilty.

"It's a ram-raid!"

From The Daily Mail:

The owners of a shop were left gobsmacked when eighty sheep flocked to their store in an Austrian ski resort.

The ram-raiders drove the owners and perplexed shoppers baa-my when they invaded the shop in St Anton and caused thousands of pounds of damage.

A spokesman for the Intersport shop said: "We think one of them saw its reflection in a mirror and came in to investigate... And being sheep, of course the rest of them decided to follow."

Once the sheep had been ejected, a tourist was enticed back into the shop, and luckily, lots of other tourists followed him in like sheep.

Cows versus bikes; sheep on roof

Via Dick Puddlecote via Essex Hunter: Via Sue from The Daily Mail:

This is the bizarre moment two fire engines were called to rescue a sheep - which was stuck on the roof of a house. Stunned residents dialled 999 after the creature was spotted scrambling across roof tiles in the remote village of Pontycymer, South Wales. A team from Bridgend Fire and Rescue Service took 40 minutes to bring the animal down from the terraced row using a Large Animal Rescue appliance...

Cue jokes implying that maybe the sheep was trying to escape a farmer with amorous intentions.