Those of you who have read my “5 reasons why I think I’m crazy” op will realise that I have a bit of a thing for sheep. Those of you who haven’t read it should get a hint of the obsession from my name! I admit it, I love sheep. So when I went on holiday to Devon recently, I was more than a little chuffed to discover something called The Big Sheep practically on my holiday home doorstep. But what was the Big Sheep? My initial visions of a gigantic fleeced animal, towering over the surrounding villages, were soon put right when I found a Big Sheep leaflet in the holiday village shop.
SO WHAT IS IT?
The Big Sheep is, quite simply, a sheep farm. The owners make money by keeping sheep and selling all things sheep related such as wool, fleece, lanolin and various sheep milk products. Not meat though, as obviously it is more profitable to keep the sheep alive and being productive. In order to boost their income, the owners have also opened the Big Sheep to the public, and put on a series of educational, sheep related shows.
On the day we decided to go it was raining first thing, so our start was somewhat delayed and we arrived just before 11am, an hour after opening. However, it turned out this was the perfect time to arrive, as the first show of the day is at 11am. The shows then continue throughout the day with only a short gap in between, so there’s no time to get bored.
WHAT ARE THESE SHOWS ALL ABOUT THEN?
The shows follow a set itinerary, and in chronological order, these shows were:
SHEEP SHEARING:
The first show of the day (and actually pretty much every show after that) was presented by a wacky Australian fella with a wonderful sense of humour. The setting for the show was a large barn type structure, with benches round the outside, and a large stage as the centre of attention. The presenter firstly told us about sheep – where they came from, what uses they have today…etc. He then went on to tell us specific and interesting facts about sheep shearing. For example, I don’t know about other people but I was a bit worried about the fact that it was a bitterly cold day but they were going to shear a sheep. However, the presenter informed us that unshorn sheep have a tendency to die in the winter because their fleeces get waterlogged, and when they lie down they can’t get up again. So although it seems cruel, shearing them is actually an attempt to save their lives. After telling us the facts, and showing us the special clothing that shearers wear (such as moccasins so that if the sheep pees on the floor they won’t slip!!) he brought out a rather nervous looking sheep and proceeded to shear it, all the time telling us what he was doing, and why he was doing it. I found this very interesting, having only ever seen sheep shearing on the television before. With the witty comments and jokes from the presenter, it was educational but fun at the same time, and the many children who were present seemed to really enjoy it.
THE SHEEP SHOW:
Once the sheep was shorn and removed from the stage, the presenter went straight into the second show of the day, the sheep show.
On the stage where he had shorn the sheep were several blocks, each with a metal object on them reminiscent of a bird table. Whilst explaining what the sheep show was, the presenter went round and filled the metal trays with grass pellets. Playing to the kids in the crowd, he said that the Big Sheep was the home of the worlds only sheep actors who loved to show off to the crowd, but only if they were encouraged. He then said that we would be introduced to 7 different sheep, each from a different breed, and that to get them on to the stage we would need to call out their names. This was a very entertaining part of the show – before calling the sheep onto the stage he would play a piece of music related to the sheep. For example, there was a breed of sheep with what looked uncannily like dreadlocks, and this sheep had been nicknamed Bob Marley. So the presenter put on some reggae music and told the kids to call for Bob Marley. At the side of the stage were buttons which controlled gates backstage, as he pushed a button and opened the gate the relevant sheep would trot out onto the stage, jump on the nearest block and proceed to eat the grass pellets. The kids absolutely loved this part of the show, squealing with delight as each sheep trotted out onto the stage. As an adult who realised that the sheep only came out to get the food, I wasn’t so impressed with the claims of highly trained sheep, but I definitely found the stories about each breed extremely interesting, and the sight of 7 sheep in such close proximity to me kept me grinning throughout the entire show!
DUCK TRIALS:
Once the sheep show had finished we were informed that the next show would take place in 10 minutes and that it would be the duck trials. Everyone trooped off to the venue – a small, enclosed grassy area with some obstacles. The seating was again of the bench variety, but was all under cover, which was extremely useful as it was drizzling and quite cold. Again the show was presented by the wacky Australian chap, who explained that often young sheepdogs are nervous of sheep, and that if the sheep sense this they will gang up on the dog and refuse to budge. As a result, to train their young sheepdogs they use ducks. Sounds crazy I know, but he then proceeded to introduce us to a young sheepdog of just a year old, and also a flock of ducks all hanging out together in one corner of the field. By the way, when I say ducks I mean the long necked, white variety, like the one from the Babe movies, rather than the brown kind you see swimming around on ponds. The Duck Trials was hilarious – think one man and his dog, but replace the sheep with ducks! The dog was apparently feeling a bit rebellious on the day we went, as were the ducks, which led to hilarity as the dog plonked itself into the pond in the middle of the field and refused to move, while the ducks calmly walked out of the gate and wandered off! However, once the presenter managed to get the ducks back and pull the dog out of the pond it all went rather well, with the dog herding the ducks through and around obstacles, and looking pleased with himself the whole time.
BOTTLE FEEDING LAMBS:
Because it was October when we went, I didn’t think there would be any lambs to bottle-feed. However, as the lambs are specially bred by the Big Sheep, there were actually 16 of them that needed bottle-feeding. For this everyone went back into the barn that had housed the sheep shearing and sheep show. I didn’t actually intend to take part in this as there were a lot of kids present and I thought it only fair to let them have the fun. However, after the presenter (yep, that Australian bloke again) had asked for volunteers there was one poor little lamb with no one to feed it, so I eagerly stepped in to fill the gap. After explaining that the lambs were all triplets and that their mothers could only cope with 2 lambs at a time, the presenter handed bottles of milk out to all the volunteers, and then explained how to hold the bottle so the lamb didn’t gulp a lot of air. He then said that the lambs all liked to be referred to as Charlie, and that to get them to come in for their food, we all had to shout Charlie as loudly as we could. This led to a moment of hilarity when my mum, engrossed in reading the Big Sheep leaflet, didn’t shout Charlie at the appointed moment. Being an honest soul, she confessed to not shouting out when the presenter asked her, and as a result had to stand on the stage, with a microphone, and sing Baa Baa Black Sheep along with all the kids. Poor mum!! Once her humiliation had ended, we all shouted CHARLIE and all of a sudden 16 seemingly starving lambs came tearing round the corner and headed for anyone clutching a bottle. I ended up with 3 all trying to latch on to the bottle I was holding, and thought I’d have to make the awful decision of deciding which one to feed. Luckily the presenter pulled two of them away, leaving me with a gorgeously soft little lamb sucking away at the bottle. This was a wonderful experience, the lambs are so engrossed in eating that they’re more than happy to be stroked and petted. Unfortunately it was over all too quickly :0(
THE BIG SHEEP BEER SHOW:
As well as being a sheep farm, the Big Sheep also houses a brewery. This is a recent addition, which could quite clearly be seen by the show! The resident Australian chap was joined by…guess who…another Australian chap, for the purposes of doing a show partially about beer making in general, and partially about the specific beers produced by the Big Sheep Brewery. I would say “unfortunately they didn’t seem to know what they were talking about” but it wasn’t unfortunate at all, it was hilarious, and helped along nicely by the fact they were allowed to drink the famous Black Sheep Lager as a means of demonstrating how delicious it is. This seemed to perk them up no end!! To say the show was informative would probably be an exaggeration, with the pair of them reading from flash card style prompts, and giggling like school kids. To say it was hilarious is definitely NOT an exaggeration!
SHEEPS LUNCH BREAK – A CHANCE TO EXPLORE:
After the beer show is what is cutely called “sheep’s lunch break.
” Or, in other words, time for the mad Australian blokes to calm down before the afternoon shows! This lasts half an hour, and is the only point of the day when there is nothing to watch. However, there isn’t a chance to get bored, as there are various other things to be explored such as the gift shop, the indoor farm or Ewetopia.
THE INDOOR FARM:
This houses all the lambs that were bottle fed earlier on in the day, plus some older sheep. There are also goats, rabbits, guinea pigs, miniature ponies and pot-bellied pigs. All are in pens, but everything can be petted and fed with specially purchased grass pellets, which are available for 30p a bag from reception. Wandering around exclaiming with delight at all the cute little animals takes up longer than you might think; we were there for over half an hour, which meant we missed the next show. However, this was a repeat of a previous show, so we weren’t bothered.
EWETOPIA:
This is the ultimate in indoor playgrounds! It is situated next to the family restaurant, and is a huge structure made of tunnels and nets and monkey bars and ball pools and goodness knows what else. Unfortunately only those under 8 are allowed to enter, so I couldn’t get in and have a really good nose around. It’s free to use and the kids on it looked like they were having great fun. I felt sorry for all the slightly older kids though, looking on in distress as their younger siblings climbed and played whilst they were deemed too old to use it.
THE GIFT SHOP:
After the sheep’s lunch break, the shearing show and the sheep show are repeated, so once we’d had a bite to eat at the Ewetopia restaurant (very reasonable prices, a 14 inch hot dog and fries and a double bacon cheeseburger and fries plus 2 fizzy drinks set us back £7.50) we decided to go and browse the gift shop. I wisely asked my other half to hang on to my money and not give it to me, no matter how much I begged, as we’d already managed to spend a fortune in the first couple of days of the holiday. It’s lucky he decided to be firm with me, because I could literally have emptied my bank account without a moment’s hesitation! The Big Sheep gift shop is, quite literally, a shrine to sheep. You can get soft toys, clothing, mugs, plates, bowls, books, postcards, posters, cookie jars, money boxes, ornaments…to name but a few…and they all feature sheep in some shape or form. There was also a very good range of adults and children’s fleeces and woollen clothing, but these seemed a little pricey to me, with the adult fleeces starting at around £40 and rapidly climbing. However, everything else, such as the soft toys and ornaments, seemed very reasonably priced, and no more than you would pay anywhere else. There’s so much to look at that we spent almost half an hour in this gift shop before wandering off to the other, much smaller gift shop. This one was much more specialised and sold only products that could be made from sheep’s milk, things like yoghurt and ice-cream and feta cheese.
Free samples are available on most things, but the prices seemed very steep to me, they were charging £5.00 for a 500ml tub of sheep’s milk ice-cream, so we didn’t buy anything here.
ON WITH THE SHOW:
Once the shearing and sheep shows had been repeated, it was time for a new lot of shows.
SHEEP DOG TRIALLING:
Much like the duck trials, but this time using fully grown sheep. The Australian guy who made a brief appearance during the beer show reappeared to take 3 sheepdogs of varying ages through their paces. He explained that sheepdogs are never forced to work; they just do it for fun. This was demonstrated extremely well by the fact that although he was working with only one dog at a time, the other two were shaking with excitement, so keen were they to join in.
HORSE WHISPERING:
Still staying with the same Australian chap, we then moved to the next field along from the sheep dog trialling, where there was a rather nervous looking horse. The presenter explained the theory of horse whispering, and confessed that he was still learning and that the woman who usually did the horse whispering had left for the season! However, he managed to calm the horse down very quickly, to the point where it didn’t panic when one of the sheepdogs got bored and started to weave in and out of it’s legs!
SHEEP RACING!!
The highlight of the day, and one of the main reasons I went to the Big Sheep in the first place. Sheep Racing is famous, I’ve seen it on the television on a couple of different shows, and apparently it has appeared on over 100 different television shows in various countries. Sheep Racing is literally what it sounds like and features varying numbers of sheep (5 on the day we were there) with soft toy jockey sheep strapped to their backs, racing around a course and avoiding obstacles. There is a chance to bet on your favourite sheep, and just like horse racing each sheep is given odds. The odds on favourite on the day we went was Lucky Boy. Having run out of money, we didn’t place a bet, which was unfortunate because the sheep I liked the look of, with odds of 5/1, actually managed to win! The sheep racing was, without a doubt, the best bit of the day. The little toy sheep bouncing around on the backs of the real sheep were worth the entrance fee on their own!!
OVERALL – DID IT MEET UP TO MY EXTREMELY HIGH EXPECTATIONS?
I can’t recommend The Big Sheep highly enough!! Not only does it feature dozens of cute little sheep, it’s highly educational but without seeming so. The presenters are fabulous at what they do; encouraging audience participation and making total strangers feel like they’re all part of one big happy group. Adults will have fun watching the beer show and enjoying the free samples in the brewery, kids will love Ewetopia and the chance to interact with all the animals. We were there from 11am until almost 5pm, and it cost us £13.10 for two adult tickets plus 4 bags of grass pellets. To me, this represents fantastic value for money! A wonderful family day out which wasn’t even spoilt by the fact that it drizzled the whole way through.
If I could give this 6 stars out of 5, I would!
THE BORING BUT NECESSARY BIT – HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?
Season tickets - Valid for a year from date of purchase
Adults- £24
Children - £20
Family - 2 Adults & up to 4 children - £85
Daily
Adults- £5.95
Children - £4.95
Family - 2 Adults & up to 4 children - £22
£2 if return within 7 days
Groups - adults and children £3.00
FREE entry for an hour coffee or tea stop.
Parties standard - £5.95
Parties Premiere - £8.50
Party bags £1 or £2
Nursery groups - £4.50 all adults - all children FREE.
For further information and prices, visit www.thebigsheep.co.uk
CONTACT DETAILS:
The Big Sheep
Abbotsham
Bideford
North Devon
EX39 5AP
Phone : 01237 472366
Fax: 01237 477916
E-mail : info@thebigsheep.co.uk
Situated just off the A39 between Bideford and Clovelly. Well signposted from several miles away.
And that, as they say, is all folks! A big thank you to anyone who bothered to read the whole way through! Apologies for the length, blame the Big Sheep for having so much to see and do!
NB - please note that there aren't any rides at the Big Sheep, so I have taken "rides" to be "shows" instead!
Sheep Racing, Duck Trialling and Feta Cheese 
