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Baaa-d day for Angus breeder as 16 sheep go on a two-mile wander

Maddie Cairns spent several hours frantically searching for the Shetland ewes.

Angus missing sheep
Maddie Cairns' missing pedigree sheep were found two miles away from home. Image: Maddie Cairns

An Angus sheep breeder feared it was going to be a baa-d day on Wednesday when she woke to find 16 of her pedigree sheep missing from their field.

Things definitely took a ewe-turn for the better when Maddie Cairns found her Shetland ewes in a pea field around two miles away from her home in Hayton, between Glamis and Forfar.

However, just when Maddie, 21, thought everything was going well her sheep decided they weren’t going to make life simple.

Maddie said: “Sadly they got spooked meters from the yard and disappeared into a field of rape seed – so it became a case of looking for a needle in a hay stack.

“If people in the area can look out for them that would be great.”

Sheep escape through hole in fence of Angus field

Maddie, 21, explained that when she checked on the sheep on Tuesday evening at 6pm they were happily grazing in their field.

But by 8am on Wednesday they had made a bold bid for freedom.

Maddie, who breeds rare sheep including Shetlands and North Ronaldsays, says she discovered a hole in a fence in their field.

She said: “They had been munching away at some overgrown grass and obviously uncovered a hole in the fence where they then planned their escape.”

And where one sheep goes the others will follow.

Angus missing sheep
Maddie’s sheepdog Max, who helped round up the runaways. Image: Maddie Cairns

Maddie said: “I went scouring round the local countryside and after several hours found them in a pea field around two miles away

“Fortunately none of them were hurt or in any way put out by their adventure and I was initially able to round them up and then it all went wrong and they took off again.”

Maddie, some helpers and her sheepdog Max, a kelpi x huntaway, were still hunting for her missing sheep at the time of going to press.

Maddie, who began breeding pedigree sheep around two years ago, currently has a flock of 85.

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