From This Side of the Gate

Meet Mac, the Charollais ram whose quiet presence reminds us that every animal on our farm carries a story of its own.

From this side of the gate, small-scale shepherding looks a little different than it may seem from the other side.

For us, it begins with knowing the sheep individually.

Mac is only with us for a season. Lent by a dear friend, he’ll soon move to Vancouver Island to become part of another flock’s story. Knowing that makes our time with him feel all the more special.

Stewardship is found in the ordinary rhythm of each day.

Watching over the flock through every kind of weather.

Being present during lambing.

Quietly noticing when something isn’t right.

It means remembering bloodlines and recognizing personalities. Noticing the small details that make each sheep different from another.

Mac likes back scratches and sunflower seeds. He has his own particular ways of doing things, his own temperament, his own presence among the flock.

He is not simply a ram in the flock.

He is Mac.

Perhaps this is one of the hardest things to explain about raising livestock. Caring deeply for an animal while also recognizing its place within the food system.

Knowing Mac as an individual doesn’t lessen the work of farming.

It deepens it.

The flock and the land are woven together.

The sheep depend on the pasture, and the pasture is shaped by their presence. Caring for one means paying attention to the other, to the grass, the seasons, the weather, and the health of the land beneath their feet.

Still much of their life is the life of a sheep. Given the opportunity, they spend their days moving across the landscape, grazing, resting together, and raising their lambs in the places where they live.

Wool is another part of that story.

A sheep raised for meat can still grow a remarkable fleece. Genetics, nutrition, and care all leave their mark.

At our last shearing, Mac’s fleece weighed in at 9 pounds. Nine pounds of wool he had carried through rain, frost, and spring grass before offering it back to us.

No two fleeces are quite the same. Some are soft and fine, some strong and lustrous, some full of crimp and bounce. Each has its own character and its own possibilities, spinning, felting, weaving, knitting, or simply becoming something warm and useful.

For us, wool is another way of knowing our sheep. It is something they carry through the seasons, and something we have the privilege of carrying forward.

Raising animals for food is not something everyone will agree with, and those conversations matter.

So does understanding the work of caring for animals, tending land, and participating in the food system.

None of this makes farming simple.

A glimpse of what it looks like from this side of the gate.

To see the sheep in the pasture.

The shepherd who tends them.

The land that sustains them.

And the stories they carry together.