Sheep savers: a love story

"There's a good mother," Greg said. The ewe had positioned herself on a rock in the yard, the better to face in the direction of her distant lamb. We could hear the lamb's answering cry each time the ewe bleated, which was constantly. We thought the lamb was down at the fish house. They were calling back and forth, so we thought a reunion would be happening soon. It didn't seem like anything extraordinary.

I went on down to the dock to bail out my rowboat, Roseneath. She had taken a lot of water in the latest rainstorm and it was past time for me to dry her out. As I approached the dock I could hear the lamb more clearly. It wasn't at the fish house after all. At first I thought it might be caught somewhere near the dock, but soon I realized that it was way over on the point. Now I could see it wandering disconsolately back and forth, answering its mother. The point is a long way around the cove from the fish house and I wondered how they would find each other.

But I remembered what LeRoy told me: don't try to help. They will find each other in the end.So I climbed down into the rowboat and got on with bailing.

I watched a speedboat coming across the channel from the direction of Gunning Cove. It went on around the outside of the point, in the direction of the lighthouse. The lamb and the ewe continued calling to each other across the cove. By now the ewe and a couple of her ewe friends had walked down the path to the fish house. She was standing on the shore, looking out over the water in the direction of the point.

Some time later I began to hear the lamb making a different sound. Written on the page, it could look like: glub, glub, baaa -- glub, glub, baaa. The baaas were growing weaker, too. In its determination to find its mother, the lamb had decided to take the shortest route. It had plunged into the cove waters and was trying to swim across. It would never make it, though. The waters were placid but the distance from shore to shore is about two hundred yards. It would tire and drown.

Then I heard the speedboat coming slowly into the cove. Evidently the boaters -- an older man, a younger man, and a couple of kids and dogs -- had noticed the lamb on their way out, then seen it in the water as they were coming back. They had decided to help. They cut the motor and rowed, I guess, to the lamb. I had climbed up onto our dock, but I couldn't really see what was happening just then. They reached over the side and held the lamb's head, then slowly motored across the cove, toward the fish house. I heard one of them say, "I can't believe we are sheep savers!" Which they were.

When they approached the fish house and the rocky shore there, they let the lamb go. But instead of heading toward the shore, it swam in a circle around the boat and tried to stay with it. Then the boaters held its head again and using their oars they rowed among the underwater rocks, closer to the shore. They let the lamb go again and this time it swam to shore and slowly clambered up rockweed-covered rocks.

All this time the mother had been watching, standing next to the fish house. Now she began calling out again. I thought the lamb would be exhausted but since it had a free ride, it wasn't. It trotted through the woods and met up with its mother and her two ewe friends. There was much wiggling and greeting and then the four of them pranced merrily up the path together. The sheep savers went on their way, having done a very good deed which I was lucky to observe.

I had bailed out Roseneath by now, so I rowed out to check the gillnet. When I came back the little group had moved into the lower orchard. The lamb looked especially clean after its bath in the cove, and it was keeping close to its mother.

When I was rowing in the cove I saw the larger part of the flock out on the point. The smaller group -- the group at our house --must have gotten separated after the great ingathering last Thursday. The flock on the point was eating kelp and lying about peacefully. One lamb was off by itself though, standing on the ridge and crying for its mother. I'm pretty sure they will find each other in the end.

This story is illustrated with a map. But the map does not show everything there is to see around the cove. It only shows the places and characters that are mentioned in the story. As always, you can click on the image if you want to enlarge it.

A lighthouse artist

I mentioned in an earlier post that there are names and initials carved in the stones around the lighthouse. Here is an interesting depiction of what appear to be two lighthouses. Beneath them is carved the name of the man who is the likely artist. But most of his name has been worn away by wind and rain. All that's left are the initial J and the first letter of a last name -- M.According to the census records in 1901 and 1911, the light keeper during that decade was John McKenna. He was 53 years old in 1901, and his wife Catherine was 56. A decade later John was still the light keeper and his wife Catherine was still alive. In 1911 their son Robert was listed as the assistant light keeper, and the head of a household that included his wife Lillian and their four young children. John McKenna kept the light at Cape Roseway from 1899 to 1920.*

Even though it's impossible to read the name carved below the lighthouses, it seems likely that it is John McKenna's. And this may not be a carving of two different lighthouses, but two views of Cape Roseway Light: front and back.

* Thanks to Kim Walker, Archivist at the Shelburne County Archives and Genealogical Society, for writing to tell me how long John McKenna was lightkeeper.

Shepherding day

The shepherds came on the island again this week. They wanted to de-worm the sheep for a second time to increase their chances of staying healthy and strong. We asked if they needed any help gathering the sheep from the lighthouse. "Sure," they said. So we set off from the lighthouse with about forty ewes and lambs.
At first the sheep tried to run off into the woods. But once they had been gathered, we walked behind them and beside them to prevent them from leaving the rocky shoreline.
Their other option was the deep blue sea.
The border collies did most of the work, and the d'Entremonts, Mary
and LeRoy. Greg and Blake walked behind the flock. The rest of us walked beside them. Mostly the whole walk was calm. We stopped to rest a few times.
The rests were for the sheep. They were working hard to walk along the rocks for so long, in the bright sun. The shepherds enjoyed the rests too. The sheep were quite sneaky. Every once in a while a ewe and her lamb would quietly attempt to run for it.
But the dogs were on top of the situation.
Mary and LeRoy's daughter Anna is a terrific shepherd.
Anna took this picture of Mike Andre and Amanda Huron, two shepherds visiting from Washington DC.
Anna took Blake's picture, too. Blake's grandfather owned sheep on the island back when he was the lighthouse keeper. So Blake is following a family tradition.
Even when the dogs are resting they never take their attention from the sheep.
The flock is almost to the corral now.
The tide was quite high when we finally arrived at the corral. The flock did not want to cross through that water. They hemmed and they hawed. They looked for alternative routes, and one feisty lamb made a serious break for freedom. Finally one or two of the ewes set off through the water, with LeRoy's encouragement. Then the others followed.
They seemed relieved to join the rest of the flock inside the corral after their long journey.
Us too.