[Jacob-list] sheep memory

[Linda]

Hope everyone had a great Christmas! 

Awhile back the subject of sheep recognizing other sheep and humans came up.  I'm interested in how long does a sheep remember.

This fall a couple of young ewes that were born here came back to visit the ram.  They had been with all the ewes in my breeding group before.  There was very little head butting and no serious aggression between any of the sheep.  The two did stay together and didn't seem to form any new bonds with my sheep.

One of the ewes recently returned here for a visit and was put in with my non breeding group.  She had not seen any of these sheep for about a year.  In that group is a ewe, Sunshine, who does not like newcomers at all.  She is very, very slow to accept an addition to the flock.  She's worse this year, maybe because I didn't breed her.  Anyway, Sunshine walked up to The Gnat, gave her a sniff and walked off.  No head butting, no pushing at feed time - just accepted her.  This is not Sunshine's normal meeting with a new sheep.  Later I was a little surprised to see Gnat  bonded to the only ewe in that group that was a lamb with her.  I honestly would not have thought that sheep had long memories, but it appears that they might.

Linda
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