Cities are using sheep to graze in urban landscapes and people love it
Along the Cumberland River just north of downtown Nashville, Tennessee, tourists on party pontoons float past the recognizable skyline, but they also can see something a little less expected: hundreds of sheep nibbling on the grass along the riverbank.
The urban sheepherder who manages this flock, Zach Richardson, said sometimes the tourist boats will go out of their way to let their passengers get a closer glimpse of the Nashville Chew Crew grazing a few hundred yards away from densely populated residential and commercial buildings.
The joy people get from watching sheep graze is partly why they are becoming trendy workers in some urban areas.
https://apnews.com/article/urban-sheep-grazing-environment-tennessee-georgia-california-ae95a793c1ea9f1bec5253be0e98f679Open linkView original on lemmy.ca
10 replies
I get the overall point, but it's kind of funny that the article's title mentions sheep but the associated image features goats.
ETA: Oh wow, those are actually a type of sheep.
I know goats and sheep can look very similar, and the fact that every caption refers to this specific farmer's "flock of sheep" made me dubious.
On closer inspection those appear to be shorn sheep. Goats would mostly have horns, yet none of those do. Presumably they interviewed the farmer beforehand as well.
Just pointing this out since you got a few upvotes, I would have thought it was funny too
Many goats are disbudded so that is not the most reliable way of differentiating them. The tails are a better tell. Goats have shorter tails that typically point up. Sheep naturally have longer tails that point down (often docked for hygiene reasons).
The article says they're "hair sheep" which shed and are often raised for their meat.
From the article ...
Yeah, there are species of short hair sheep that aren't used for their wool. They're pretty neat and the ones I've been around were super friendly and loved pets
They do it with goats in my city. They let them graze to remove the poison ivy.
They did that here just two weeks ago!
People are easy to please. If my senator came by and unclogged the toilet I would love that too.
Yeah, fr. It's sad that we are at a point in history where "people enjoy watching cute animals being cute" is news. But... Yeah, of course people like nature. It's nature.