Rescuers see 'ghosts' moving along the riverbank — and save 6 beautiful animals
Recently, rescuers at Edgar’s Mission, a farm sanctuary in Victoria, Australia, received an urgent message from their friends at Lamb Care Australia. Apparently, six sheep were wandering around “like ghosts” along a riverbank nearby.
Rescuers suspected the sheep escaped a factory farm or an otherwise unsafe living situation. Now their coats were dangerously overgrown, and their bodies showed signs of flystrike, a life-threatening condition.
Upon arrival, Edgar’s Mission team members began formulating a plan, trying to figure out how they’d catch the nervous, quick-moving sheep. With help from Vets For Compassion, the rescuers cornered the sheep near the river and chased them through the brush. One sheep, who suffered from a broken leg and couldn’t run very fast, succumbed to his rescuers. Team members safely secured him along with a second sheep, his friend, who refused to leave his side.
These sheep, later named Broken River and Murray River, went back to the sanctuary to recuperate. But rescuers weren’t giving up on the other four.
Eventually, a third sheep, exhausted from running, collapsed near the bank. Rescuers named her River Diva.
“[S]he was carried to safety on a stretcher, like a queen who had long been denied her throne,” Edgar’s Mission wrote in a Facebook post.
Finally, after many attempts, team members managed to secure the final three sheep, whom they named River Dance, Rivers and Riverina.
Today, all six sheep live together at the sanctuary, relaxing after a lifetime of fear.
“[They’re] receiving the care they have long been denied,” Edgar’s Mission wrote. “Their wounds are being tended, as their burdens are slowly lifted. And though fear still lingers, something else is beginning to take its place. A quiet unfolding. A soft return.”
Edgar’s Mission director Parm Ahern is so happy the sheep are safe. She hopes this story inspires empathy for sheep and other livestock who need humans to survive.
“[W]e have shaped sheep to meet our needs, not their own,” Ahern told The Dodo. “With that shaping comes responsibility, responsibility not just to care, but to see. And here, in this small corner of the world, these six lives have been seen. And are now protected. As all rivers should be.”
