Hi Dayna,
It is normal for a female sheep to head-butt other sheep. They do it for fun and also to establish hierarchy. None of my ewes has ever tried to butt me personally, and I would not tolerate it if she did. With rams, head butting is discouraged by ensuring that the ram is afraid of you. I would imagine that you would need to do the same thing with your ewe. This goes against the grain because most of us try very hard to earn the trust of our ewes so that we can handle them easier. Deliberately doing anything to cause them to fear us feels like a set-back. But if you believe that the ewe might ever physically harm you or your husband or children, then you might want to perhaps take a squirt gun or spray bottle out with you and use it anytime you see butting behavior emerging. Hopefully, your ewe will learn that it is the bottle/gun that she should fear rather than you personally and perhaps not develop any avoidance behavior.
I'm curious if anyone else on the list has a ewe that tries to butt them.
Carol
At 08:39 PM 9/18/2004 -0700, you wrote:
What is "normal" aggression from a female Barbados? She wants to head butt (?) with myself and my husband, which we thought was a form of play with her but I'm not really sure?
=============================================== This message is from the Barbados Blackbelly Sheep mailing list (http://www.awrittenword.com/listserv/index.html). To respond to this message, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe or change your membership options, go to http://lists.coyotenet.net/mailman/listinfo/blackbelly To search the archives, go to http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
