Appearance Matters

The stags were lying down in the leggy shrubs this morning so there was some luck in us seeing them at all. I suspect this happens many times and they escape view from visitors unless someone spots, as we did, an odd antler sticking up. Now, imagine that when they stood up and when their woolly winter garb finally drops revealing their summer red coat, we were to find that they were identified by conspicuous numbers written on their sides and sundry other colourful blotches. Or if SWT decided to ‘manage’ them by capturing and then spraying them with dye to make it easier to deal with an in-house herd. Would it make any difference to our enjoyment of them? If so, why?
Daft question you might think.

I ask because each year that sheep are put on the grassy pastures lambs look less and less like the lambs I used to see in fields and on hills as a child and even up to 20 years ago. In fact they look more and more like units of an industrial process – just what we like to be reminded of when we escape into the countryside, I'm sure. Obviously not dehumanised – more de-lambified. You would think that if one thing might reconcile us to treating this land as farmland when it was meant to be for people’s enjoyment and recreation, it would be that the imported livestock looked as if they were sort of natural and being treated with respect.


Most of the things that uglify modern life happen incrementally. By the time we make our protest it’s too late and become entrenched into the way certain people have got used to doing things – examples abound. I know that thirty years ago if suddenly overnight every sheep in the countryside appeared looking like this there would have been a furious and irresistible outcry.
“Unnatural! Demeaning! Etc.”

The reason that the present day controllers of our countryside around here do not bother with what it actually looks like is that the conservation industry has become a one-trick-pony focused solely on a dubious biodiversity agenda and their minds cannot accommodate other perspectives or other values.