A farmer writes: Working with hazardous substances

By Derek Robinson

A few weeks ago, I spent the best part of a day treating my lambs against the threat of blowfly strike.

Far from regarding it as a necessary chore, this is one of my favourite farming jobs. Anyone who has spent years and years dipping sheep and lambs is probably in the same boat as myself, and can scarcely believe the ease and effectiveness of the whole operation.

In roughly five hours, I brought in four batches of sheep and lambs (including stock at an outfarm), weighed the lambs, dosed the younger ones, treated any lame animals, and finally applied a spray-on product to protect them against maggots. And all the while, I was constantly remembering the 'good old days'.

That was when stock had to be gathered, then hauled to a sheep dipper, with three or four men spending nearly two days for the numbers I'm talking about.

By contrast, this task was completed entirely by myself, with a minimal amount of stress for both man and beast.

Fun

Walking around a pen of sheep with what is basically a glorified water pistol, is pretty close to being good fun.

As long as you manage to pen them up fairly tightly, then it's a dawdle to put the five-litre container onto your back and give every lamb two good scoots, one around the tail area, and the other along the length of their back.

I usually wait till the first lamb has a 'strike', and this is the signal to go ahead and treat them all. Knowing that this simple operation will protect them for most of the summer is a source of intense satisfaction.

Later that evening, I walked through a few fields of winter wheat with a neighbour, and as we came out of the last field, I was aware that my knees were slightly itchy. My immediate thought was that this was obviously some sort of reaction to the pollen attached to the heads of the wheat plants.

I commented to him that the sun had been very strong that afternoon, and my forehead seemed to be mildly sunburnt.

Stepping out of the shower at bedtime, I became a bit suspicious that the slight burning sensation around my knees and eyes had very little to do with the sunshine, and probably had more to do with the magic 'firewater' I had been using on the lambs.

Reaction

Sure enough, I had reacted to the pour-on product, and the hot feeling around my face persisted all night. On examining the container next morning, the instructions stated quite clearly that full protective clothing had to be worn, with any accidental spillages immediately washed off with cold water. My body protection had amounted to a pair of jeans, and wiping my hands on some unsuspecting ewe. And the fumes swirling round the sheep pen merely told me that this was 'quare' good stuff!

Obviously, I should have taken all necessary precautions, just as the label recommended.

But I'm probably no different to many farmers in this respect. Indeed, if someone is seen working with livestock, while kitted out in full protective gear, they risk a good bit of mickey-taking from fellow farmers!

Given my unfortunate experience with this particular insecticide, you'd expect from now on to see me with waterproof clothing, welly boots, latex gloves, and breathing apparatus, when working with the sheep.

It's hard to teach an old dog new tricks but this was a warning to me.