BARN SHEEP

Saturday night I did my last of three  3-hour workshops, just outside of Hebron, and am now heading back home.  I should be home Monday afternoon.

            I’ve visited 10 farms, most of them several hundred sheep on more than 1,000 acres.  One was beef cattle on about 4,000 acres.  I’ve traveled to more than 20 countries in the world, but I’ve never seen anyone produce sheep like I’ve seen here in Israel in Judea and Samaria.

            Here are the protocols.  First, the sheep only graze outside about 5-8 hours a day.  They spend the rest of their time inside large sheds.  Nobody puts down carbon for bedding, so all the sheep are on solid manure packs that stink and are filthy.

            Lambs do not nurse their mothers.  On most farms, lambs go to a nursery and receive artificial milk (formula) immediately after birth.  The two main reasons for not letting the lambs nurse are that the barns are so filthy the lambs die from sickness if they’re kept with their mothers.  The second reason is that the lambs slow down the flock from its ability to walk from barn to field twice a day.

            The primary reason given for barning the sheep is security.  The 65 farmers in Judea and Samaria are occupying more land than the 800,000 Jews who live here; as a result, these farms represent the frontiers, or outposts, for holding onto land designated to Israelis by the 1990s Oslo Accords.  Arabs steal fencing, water line, animals, equipment and anything else that’s not guarded 24/7/365.  As a result, all farms have 24 hour security. 

            When the sheep go to pasture, someone is with them at all times—armed.  But the cost of hubbing the sheep in these confinement sheds isn’t cheap.  One farmer told me he averages 40 percent mortality—in other words, 40 percent of his lambs die.  To compensate for high mortality, the farmers try to lamb every 8 months; by not allowing the ewes to nurse their young, the mothers dry up immediately and put all that energy into ovulating again rather than nursing babies.

            As soon as the lambs can quit drinking milk replacer, they go on grain to grow as fast as possible.  The ewes get hay and grain too to keep their body condition up and make them cycle fast for rebreeding.  The equipment and fuel necessary to make the hay, transport it, feed it, dispense grain and even grind hay is significant.

`           The point is that if these farmers could eliminate their hay, equipment, massive sheds, milk replacer, grain and mortality, they could hire a lot of security.  That’s the crux of my encouragement to them.  The security threat is real; it has to be handled.  But if the sheep clump in mobs on pastures with a human presence, all those expenses go away

            This tradeoff would put the sheep outside where they would be healthier and would bless the fields with their manure instead of continuing to extract it.  A tight mob can be guarded easier than a spread out flock.  Many of these farmers spend up to 3 hours a day just taking their sheep out to graze and bringing them home.  That time spent with management would yield some tremendous benefits.

            I haven’t met a single farmer making a profit.  They’re all suffering under increasing grain prices, fuel prices, hay, labor, equipment and veterinary costs.  And milk replacer has tripled in price in the last year.   I don’t have all the answers, but what an honor and privilege to learn the unique challenges these farmers face, cry with them, brainstorm with them, and encourage them to bring the Biblical prophecies of desert blooming into reality.

            Our own farm in Virginia saw 200 years of exploitation and desolation before our family arrived in 1961.  This land has seen more than 2,000 years as wave after wave of foreign occupation plundered the ecology.  Both Samson and young King David killed lions in this area; bears were here; Absalom hung himself on tree branches during his revolt against his father.  This land is a far cry from lions, bears, and trees today, but all these farmers  love the land and want more than anything to restore its flourishing.  I’ve been honored to think through a path to accomplish that.

            If you had to guard your farm equipment, animals, and plants 24/7/365, how would that change your economics?

*We couldn’t resist this picture of our very own shepherd Andrew Salatin taken in 2014*