Paper short abstract:

Moving between my fieldwork on NZ sheep farms and my own experience as a shepherd, this paper uses sight, sound, touch, and smell to share the value of a sheep's life and a shepherd's vocation.

Paper long abstract:

Whilst many aspects of contemporary livestock farming are scientific, "good stockmanship" is often described as an art, or more specifically as an embodied sensibility towards farmed animals that cannot be taught even if discrete handling or husbandry skills can. Indeed, sensing sheep—using sight, sound, touch, and smell—is the primary means by which a shepherd apprehends her flock. This paper draws on my own experience as shepherd of a very small flock of sheep, and contextualises it within my broader ethnographic fieldwork with very large flocks and their shepherds. Learning the differences between individual and group behaviours is crucial to being able to anticipate sheep actions and reactions, and paying closer attention to our own senses can also attune us to the sensory experiences of animals in our care. This awareness encourages shepherds to recognise different forms of sheep agency and subjectivity, and offers new means of providing and assessing farm animal welfare, including how to elicit a sheep's cooperation rather than using force. Using a combination of writing, photography, video and audio recordings, I evoke the sheep I have known and invite others to experience them in ways that may challenge common (mis)understandings of both sheep and shepherds.