A lamb’s best friend at times of burnt offerings

Truth is, I only became Jimmy Doyle's friend because of a crush on his sister.

So when he asked me to hang around with him that afternoon at the county fair, I jumped at the chance like a wolf ambushing passing prey. Jimmy and I both were in sixth-grade, but Kathy, she was an eighth-grader.

She showed no interest in fawning over me, though, so I was stuck with him.

The problem was he'd entered the wrong kind of livestock in the fair. Though we lived in dairy country, his father persisted in raising sheep.

I was showing cattle, Holsteins to be specific. But little Jimmy Doyle and his sister Kathy were off in the sheep barn.

• • •

Being of English and Scottish heritage, my ancestors raised sheep and wheat. When they came to America, their interests turned to dairying and cornfields, though they kept an occasional hen house and hog.

One strain of Bignells and Rands went to Australia, however. I have distant sixth cousins, now known only by email, who own large sheep ranches near Perth.

So respect for such creatures probably ran in my blood. Hanging out with Jimmy, I imagined myself operating a large sheep ranch (with Kathy at my side, of course). But such daydreams ended when I tried to figure out how I would break to my father that we were selling all the Holsteins in favor of Hampshire sheep.

• • •

Though there are 300 different varieties, Hampshires are your standard, idealized version of sheep: white with black stocking legs and dark, open faces, utterly mild dispositions. When you see a cartoon sheep or buy a stuffie lamb for Easter, you're getting a Hampshire.

Frankly, I didn't know much about sheep back then. But I laughed when Jimmy tried cracking jokes and was content to sit and talk in that hot, dusty barn while most of his fellow 4-H club members wanted to run around the fairgrounds. If I stayed with him, then Kathy was sure to cross my line of sight.

So I played along whenever Jimmy and his fellow 4-Hers started talking sheep. But ewes, woolcaps, spinning counts - for a kid who'd only thought of lambs in terms of nursery rhymes and something herded by Bible characters, this was all foreign, like going to Italy.

And then they started talking about mutton.

"What's mutton?" I said.

They looked at me like I'd fallen off a large rock.

"You know," Jimmy said, "lamb meat."

"You mean you actually eat those poor things?"

"Sure. In soups and gyros and there's rack of -"

I grimaced. "I thought you just kept them for the wool."

"Well, mainly, but ..."

No buts about it ... Jimmy, his fellow 4-Hers, his family - even sweet, pure Kathy - were lamb killers.

• • •

That people eat old dairy cows too old to milk never crossed my mind as murderous. It was the natural order of things. My father did it without any remorse as did my grandfather and I'm sure my great-grandfather before him.

Perhaps my sudden queasiness came from all those images of lambs as burnt offerings. They are the creature of sacrifice through which sinful men tried to re-claim their innocence. I al-ways envisioned sheep quietly grazing in the field as the lark sang. Then some sinful herder would swoop one up, and though bleating like crazy, it would be tossed upon the coals or butchered with the thrust of a sword.

Lambs are the defenseless of the world. All they're concerned about is eating grass in the pasture.

They stand no chance against the lions of this world.

• • •

In North America, we don't have to worry about lions. But there are coyotes, even in Iowa. Though mal-igned a bit too much, they still will go after spring lambs in pasture.

This was a problem even with the Doyle's flock. So in the late 1970s they bought a pair of expensive Akbash dogs, imported from Turkey. Akbash dogs typically are white, muscular and long-legged, sort of a cross be-tween a mastiff and a hound.

Jimmy took one of the Akbash with him to the fair. He said with some of the sheep missing, it got lonely.

That's because Akbash think they are sheep. When the pups are born and raised in the sheep barn, they literally bond with them. Why? Because the dogs are good, relaxed guests. They're easy for the sheep to accept. But should something threatening appear in the pasture, the dogs' protective instincts kick in.

The Akbash truly are lamb's best friend.

• • •

One of Jimmy's fellow club members started laughing at me. "What kind of sheep farmer is your old man that you don't know what mutton is?" he said.

I swallowed hard, tried to think of a good explanation as Kathy walked away with some ninth-grade boy.

That's when Jimmy kick-ed his friend in the shins. "Shut up," he said. "His father just started raising sheep. They used to have dairy cows."

"Oh," his friend said. "I didn't know."

Jimmy glanced at me, winked.

At that moment, Jimmy and I became the truest of friends for years to come.

SIDEBAR: Iowa’s Sheep Industry

You may be enjoying an Easter ham today, but Iowa plays a significant role in the nation's sheep industry. There are about 250,000 head of sheep and lamb in the state, roughly 4 percent of those in the nation.

Believe it or not, that's ninth best in the country (Texas, California and Wyoming are way out front). The largest concentrations of sheep in Iowa are found around Kalona, Colfax and Manchester, where local sales barns are located.

(originally published April 20, 2003)