Following many days of treacherous weather conditions in some parts of the country, numerous sheep are being rescued from the Galtees after becoming trapped in deep snow.
Owner of Ballyhoura Farm Escape Accommodation in Co. Limerick, Ann Drake spoke to Agriland about the “challenging” conditions that her family and many other locals are facing to save these sheep.
Drake said that her brothers Tom, John and William, along with their nephew Billy Cunningham, and many hill sheep farming neighbours are out on the Galtees for days now digging out sheep with the help of their sheepdogs.
Snow has risen so high that gates and fences can no longer be seen. Farmers are searching for signs that sheep may be under the snow, by looking for heads sticking out.
Fortunately, sheep dogs Sue, Sally, Hemp and Ted, are able to sniff the sheep out and show the farmers where they have been buried.
“When the sheep are found, they are brought down the mountain to waiting quads and then taken home. But this is constant up and down the whole time for the last week,” Drake said.
The sheep are then taken home to be nursed and given boiled nuts, along with having their injuries looked after.
“My mother is acting like a hospital at home nursing the sheep, it is a full time job for her at the minute,” Drake said.
The Drake family have not seen snow like this in decades, with a similar account in the 1960s, where one sheep had been stuck under the snow for 15 days.
Drake said that this story has “given some hope” for those farmers out searching, however, they will not know how many sheep have survived for a number of weeks until the snow has cleared.
She said it is a “constant worry” for locals constantly checking the forecast this last week, and that people are having trouble sleeping and eating.
She said the farmers are hoping for a “natural thaw”, as rain would send the sheep further under the snow.
Drake said that the weather is “heartbreaking” and people in other parts of the country “don’t realise how bad the weather actually is”.
She said that the hazardous conditions will have “huge impact” on the whole hill sheep farming community on the Galtees and that she would like to see a humanitarian fund to relieve the impacts of the “financial and mental challenge”.