MANY farm animals may look alike to the layman, but to an observant stockman each is an individual with its own appearance and personality just like us. There are big ones and wee ones, fat ones and thin ones, while some have big ears and others don't. They may have long shaggy coats or smooth hair, some are friendly or inquisitive, shy or timid, while others are greedy bullies. I could go on, but I am sure you get my drift.

At one time dairy cows were kept in byres, tied by a chain round their neck in their own stalls that had an individual number above it. So a herd of say sixty cows would have stalls numbered one to sixty, and each cow was known by her stall number.

Milking cows twice a day, seven days a week allowed dairymen to get to know the cows and their pedigrees well. For instance, a good dairyman would know that 38 and 47 were sisters and the daughters of number 58. Apart from having individual numbers, many had pet names like Buttercup or Daisy, or even more long-winded, fancy pedigree names. Good dairymen knew the sires of their cows and the different families in their herd.

Very few cows are kept in byres nowadays, but wander about feely between their cubicles and the feeding area. In addition to the official, individual ear-tags cattle now have to have by law, they also have other large, management ear-tags embossed with numbers by which each cow is readily identifiable from a short distance. A typical herd of say 200 cows may well be numbered one to 200, similar to the old byre system. Certain breeds of dairy cows like the black and white Holstein Friesians, or brown and white Ayrshires, have distinctive and unique markings that also help to identify individuals.

Other dairy breeds, like Jerseys and Guernseys, may be more uniform in colour, but are still recognisable to the good dairyman. It's much the same with beef cattle of a uniform colour like black Aberdeen Angus or red Limousins - a good cattle man knows each and every one of his cows.

I like cattle and used to keep 70 crossbred beef cows that I bred myself and knew individually as a result of feeding them twice a day for the six months they were indoors during the winter, as well as checking them regularly during the summer. Just like a dairyman, I knew the family relationships within my herd.

Sadly, I only ever got to know little more than about 10 per cent of my flock of 700 breeding ewes individually. Unlike my cows that could live on the farm for ten years or more, I only kept my ewes for four or five years before selling them on as culls. So working with ten times the number of ewes than cows, and unlike my cattle not breeding my own replacements, but buying them at the autumn sales to produce cross-bred lambs for slaughter, meant I had less opportunity to get to know them all individually. Still, I have to confess that is a lame excuse for the fact that I was never as keen on sheep as I was on cattle.

Others are as fanatical about their sheep as I was with my cows. They too can cite the different pedigrees going back through the generations. Some breeds like the Blackface can have distinctive facial markings, but others like Cheviots, Lleyns or Suffolks may look all the same to a layman - but, as with good cattlemen, a good shepherd knows most of the individuals in his large flock, that can number a thousand or more.

Such people are referred to as "guid kenners", and their almost encyclopaedic knowledge is awesome. They can stand in an auction ring at the autumn sales, and without referring to written pedigrees - which don't exist for hill breeds - can trot out the sires or dams of their rams going back several generations. Quite a few undoubtedly blag it, but most of them are genuinely giving a true account of the lineage of the rams they are selling with references to any well-known, high-priced rams that are in the pedigree.

Of course there is more to being a guid kenner than just remembering pedigrees. As with good cattle breeders, top sheep breeders carefully observe individuals and their families within the flock. They get to know the bloodlines that thrive in their particular conditions, and consistently breed top performers by matching certain attributes in rams with the ewes they are bred with. As a result, they produce the type of sheep the market wants and that go on to put their stamp on other flocks.

As with top cattle breeders, one can only admire the skill of such people and recognise that there are good reasons for other breeders to pay astronomic sums for top rams or bulls, that can in some instances match the price of a house.

ENDS