Before They Were Famous 2: Suckie & Darkie

It isn’t just the dogs who have grown up, the sheep have too. Suckie and Darkie are two of my favourite sheep, but what did they get up to, before they were famous?

Suckie

Suckie’s story begins in 2005. She was in an adaptor with some other lambs, but she wasn’t doing very well. She was blind (an unfortunate condition in Texel lambs is ingrowing eyelashes. This causes temporary blindness for a week or so, and eventually wears off, leaving the lambs with perfect sight) in both eyes, and was thin. I didn’t think she was going to make it, but me and my dad took her under our wings. She got rides on the quad, bottles of milk three times a day, and her sight returned.

I called her Suckie because I had watched a BBC movie called “Pride”, which was about lions. One of the lions was called Suki, and I liked the name at the time. Then, when I was feeding her, I thought of the name Suckie, because she sucked milk a lot.

But then, Suckie’s centre-of-attention bliss ended with the arrival of Titch. He was someone for Suckie to play with and she did enjoy the company. Titch was plainly stupid, and Suckie took advantage of this and became the boss. Titch and Suckie both loved to eat sheep meal, play fight and most of all, drink milk. Then, I decided to halter train Titch and Suckie to walk with me. Maybe it was because Titch was a bit dumb, but Titch was better at walking than Suckie.

This is Titch with Suckie in 2005.

Suckie also has a habit of escaping and opening buckets of nuts to eat them.

Suckie’s first lambs, Dot and Daisy, were born on Sunday 17th of February 2008. Their mum, Suckie, had escaped just an hour previously and had been opening buckets, stealing nuts and generally making a mess everywhere. Just as we were about to go inside for lunch, Suckie wandered to the far end of the house and lay down. To start with, we didn’t take much notice of her, and thought she was just tired. Then I noticed her pushing. I went to investigate – Suckie was going to give birth! I sat down on the ground beside her, hoping to see Suckie give birth naturally. But despite all of her efforts, Suckie was struggling – so Dad had to give her a helping had – literally. I put Suckie on the halter and led her into a pen. A few minutes later, and Dot and Daisy were born.

Suckie with newborn Dot and Daisy.

The following year, Suckie had a single male lamb called Eddie, and the year after, another single lamb named Freddie.

This is Eddie:

And this is Freddie:

Meanwhile, Titch grew into a very handsome guy.

But we had to sell him, because he kept head-butting people. Silly boy.

Darkie

Darkie’s story begins in 2006, when her mother abandoned her. We bottle fed her and she grew quickly.

From this (2006):

To this (2009):

Darkie had twins in 2010, Rita and Roy.

And now you know what Suckie and Darkie got up to before they were famous…

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