Midge, the rescued sheep, lived at the Woolly Patchwork Sheep Sanctuary in Lampeter (https://www.facebook.com/WPSSanctuary). The photos are from that site.
Midge was a special sheep who even contributed to Greyhound Rescue Wales! I spun and hand dyed her wool to make a scarf to go in GRW’s Pawsome Auction (https://www.facebook.com/groups/254066462132570).
Midge was given to the Sheep Sanctuary in 2015 as a 2-day old lamb. Apparently she was unable to suckle from her mother. It turned out she had inturned eyelids in both eyes and poor little girl had such sore eyes she couldn’t bare to open them. So….off to the vets she went and had small staples clipped into the skin underneath both eyes to hold the eyelids out. This causes no pain to the lamb whatsoever even though it looks pretty drastic and the clips fall out of their own accord after about 10 days.
Sadly this wasn’t the end of Midge’s woes. The prolonged irritation to the eyeball also caused ulceration to both eyeballs so she had to have cream inserted into both eyes twice daily for at least a week.She was a wonderful patient and took all the treatment in good spirit. Being a texel, her life revolved around the next meal rather than worrying about her eyes!!! After 10 days all her problems had healed and she was 100% healthy in all respects. Her condition was hereditary trait, so lambs born with this problem are not kept in the flock as replacements. She most certainly would have been sent to slaughter younger than most because of her condition.
But Midge was able to live out a full and happy life at the Sheep Sanctuary for nine years. In many ways it was lucky for her that she was born with problems!
Caroline gave her a wonderful life with lots of sheepy company, shelter when she wanted it and of course lots of ‘biccits’ which she loved. She was also a sheep who enjoyed her human giving her a good scratch.
Midge loved eating. She certainly didn’t stress about her figure (well done Midge, I approve).
Poor Midge died on the 3rd April 2024 in Caroline’s arms. I am told it was the dreaded ‘texel throat’, a disease effecting the upper respiratory tract of the sheep. Breeders continue breeding sheep with this knowing they have it. I suppose the short life of most sheep means that they decide it doesn’t really matter.1
Midge was a sweet and lucky sheep. Thank you Caroline for giving her a great life and RIP sweet Midge.
Other Sheep With Tales
Footnotes
- The average life of lambs in the UK is only 6 or 7 months according to a Defra survey and even breeding ewes are killed at between 4-6 years. Texels are bred mainly for meat so the few living longer life tend to be breeding stock who are killed between 4 to 6 years. ↩︎
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