Meeting our neighbours - the fleecy kind

One beautiful Spring morning as I was preparing my "wake up" coffee, I heard excited barks from Oliver and the unmistakable ringing of bells.

Just below our house are a couple of terraces and passing along the top one was a flock of sheep, in a terrible hurry. All my old townie instincts came to the fore, who should I phone, pest control, emergency services, etc . Where had they all come from?

In plein panic and heading for the phone I heard a piercing whistle and the sheep as one turned their heads, and started making their retreat.

An apologetic muscular, golden haired, young man then appeared from round the corner and told me that he had forgotten about the new people i.e us. He introduced himelf, the sheepdog and the flock. Apparently our local bergér would be passing our house regularly with his sheep during the Spring and Autumnal months. A piece of information that the previous owners had neglected to pass on! And there was I thinking that the terraces below us were merely to provide a lovely view and to act as a flood barrier should the babbling brook turn into a raging torrent during the winter.

How very Jean Floret I thought to myself and immediately pondered upon the etiquette between the Anglais townie and the French shepherd, who would be seeing quite a lot of each other apparently. My London friends thought it all sounded too romantic and some of my girlfriends, upon receiving my description of the young bergér, wanted to know if he was single!

Well with the sheep came droppings which Oliver would gaze at longingly from the upper terrace. Then by cover of nightfall he would race down to the lower terraces and hoover up as much as he could with great delight. All the grazing in the Cevennes is rich with wild mint and other herbs and this proved to be a potent concoction whence digested by our weimaraner. About 15 minutes after eating this rural delicacy, he would race around the garden on some sort of herbal high, doing high speed circuits .

The sheep became a very enjoyable fixture in our lives, never more so than in June when in preparation for the transhumance* they were all dressed up in brightly coloured pom-poms. A true carnival of colour.

Over time we all got to know each other well and even the sheepdog tolerated Oliver’s enthusiasm as a would-be sheepdog. Oliver even saved a couple, one which had dawdled behind and got caught up in netting. My husband went to cut it free and walked the sheep home using Ollies lead, “well I didn’t know what to do with it”!!! Another sheep had fallen from the wayside during the transhumance and luckily Oliver found it 2 days later severley dehydrated and distressed but still with pom-poms intact.

One spring day a wedding invitation was dropped into our letter box, it seemed our much beloved bergér was marrying a local bergére. We were very honoured to be invited to their wedding and awaited the day with much excitement.
After the official service at the Mairie there was an open air blessing and there casually strolling amongs the other guests where several, yes you’ve guessed it – sheep, complete with pom-poms!

source Wikipedia:

Older sources use the term transhumance for vertical seasonal livestock movement, typically to higher pastures in summer and to the lower valleys in winter. The herders have a permanent home, typically in the valley. Only the herds and a subset of people necessary to tend them travel. This is termed fixed transhumance .

Some recent studies consider nomadism, where livestock move to follow grazing over considerable distances following set seasonal patterns (with the whole family of herders living in temporary shelters which move with the herds all the year round), a form of transhumance. This is termed nomadic transhumance.

Traditional or fixed transhumance, in which livestock ascend to mountain pastures in summer and descend to relatively warm areas in the valleys, foothills, plains or desert fringe in winter, occurs throughout the world, including Scandinavia, France, Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, Spain, Turkey, Switzerland, Georgia and Lesotho. It is also practiced amongst the more nomadic Sami people of Scandinavia. Transhumance is based on the difference of climate between the mountains (where the herds stay during the summer) and the lowlands (where they remain the winter). Its importance to pastoralist societies cannot be overstated. Milk, butter and cheese — the dairy products of transhumance — often form the basis of the local population's diet.

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