For six months I have been lookerer to the riverside flock, a kind of commis shepherd with a watching brief over 23 charges. And what lookers they are – stocky little Southdown ewes with coats so dense and fine that they appear already knitted. These sheep have such endearing faces that – depending on the tilt of their curly fringes – they resemble either teddy or koala bears. Under the soft exteriors, these are tough beasts. They sat through December's snow and arctic temperatures with insulated stoicism while magpies tapdanced over their ice-matted backs. They are wild domestics whose ancestors were bred on the Sussex Downs more than 200 years ago. I have stopped long enough for some heads to go up and the alerted animals begin to bustle closer. This trotting affection has to be recognised for what it is: bucket love. They stop a few feet short and seeing I have nothing edible for them, bury their heads in the tussocks again.
The tenant shepherd brings fresh promise to what had been an ill-fated field. For some years, it lay ungrazed, the meadow flowers choked out by rank grasses, docks and thistles. Two springs ago, three cows were put into the meadow, but within a week they had leapt into the river and drowned. There is docile life in the meadow now, and hope for a flowering future with these living lawnmowers. Over the autumn and winter, they have bitten the knee-high grass down to size.
For seven big-bellied ewes, this week we are the shepherds they shall not want. Lambing will take place out in the open without any human assistance. Foxes prowl the opposite bank of the river, but they are unlikely to enter the electric-fenced field. And if they try, I can imagine the newborn's companions flocking around them in a protective ring of woolly sisterhood.