Remembering Radar (From Gazette & Herald)

Remembering Radar

FINDING out that one of the pet lambs is blind has brought back memories of Radar, a blind lamb we reared several years ago. In the field, Radar's problems were very obvious. He just stood trembling and bawling, a tiny scrap of a lamb, completely lost in a strange environment. Occasionally his mother came up to check on him, and his pathetic attempts to scramble under her came to nought as she wandered away, leaving Radar stranded.

Brought back inside and bottle fed long after strictly necessary, Radar benefited from sharing a stable with the frailest of the pet lambs and orphans of the flock. Reason was drowned in the flood of sentimentality that washed over us every time we fed him. Harder visitors used to come and say: "That lamb wants knocking on the head, what's the point of a blind lamb, you're mad." We just pointed out how clever Radar was, possessing extra sensory perception where feeding bottles were concerned, nosing in and pushing quieter and weaker lambs out of the way for an extra suck of milk.

When the time came to evict the pet lambs from their stable and put them out to grass, chaos ensued. A very loud, very piercing and very distressed wailing assailed our ears from the paddock. Our sightless lamb was totally overwhelmed by the change in environment and loss of close contact with his companions. Whilst in the stable he only bumped occasionally into the walls and bales of straw. Now he bounced off the telegraph pole in the field, walked into the fence, collided with the barn wall and fell into puddles. And all the time made the most terrific racket.

He earned his name Radar; from the curious swinging head movements he adopted to locate the source of any noise. I wanted to call him Triffid after the deadly, sightless, walking plants in the science fiction book, but they're not a literary lot in our house. The Triffids tracked down their victims from the noises they made, just like Radar.

He adapted well to life in the paddock quickly learning to negotiate and locate obstacles, although problems occurred when John moved runs that housed ducks, geese or pheasants without telling him. His increasing plumpness threatened his existence. "We can't eat him," I would argue. "He'll be delicious" John would counter. Luckily no market would accept him with his handicap, and he enjoyed several blissful, carefree years in the paddock, disrupting everything around him.

Radar was a dreadful nuisance when stock was being moved in the paddock. Instead of running away from the loud whoops and claps that shooed the other animals on, Radar ran towards the noise. As he had such a good reputation amongst the other lambs of knowing where the action was at mealtimes, they all then decided to follow him. The air turned a little blue on those occasions.

Any work in his paddock was of great interest to Radar and a project to lay new power cables to the grain store fascinated him. Drawn to the noise of digging and conversation, he kept falling into the trench that had been dug. He stood behind John, head cocked on one side, listening to every shovelful of earth coming out. And then fell in again. By the time the power cable was laid, Radar was one very muddy lamb.

Radar survived his contemporaries and lived to accompany another two sets of pet lambs in the paddock. He would bumble along with any stock in the paddock, annoying them all by his habit of regularly bumping into the nearest sheep or lamb to establish his bearings. If there was no other lamb in the vicinity he bawled and bleated away until finally one of the small flock relented and betrayed their whereabouts to him.

When we first realised the extent of his handicap, John consulted the vet to see if there was a cure or reason for Radar's blindness. There was no cure and no rational reason. One morning, when he was just over two years old, we found him lying dead under the willow tree. "One of those things," John said. But he gulped as he said it.

Updated: 11:23 Thursday, April 25, 2002