Australian mourns beloved aunt with heart-shaped love ewes

An Australian farmer couldn’t go to his aunt’s funeral because of pandemic restrictions so he paid his respects with a novel alternative: dozens of sheep arranged in the shape of a love heart.

Drone-shot video of pregnant ewes munching barley in a paddock while unwittingly expressing Ben Jackson’s affection for his beloved Auntie Deb was viewed by mourners at her funeral in the city of Brisbane in Queensland state this week.

Jackson was locked down at the time across a state border at his farm in Guyra in New South Wales state, 430 kilometres away.

Jackson says it took a few goes to get it right and the final result is as close to a heart as he could get it.

Jackson started experimenting with making shapes with sheep to relieve the monotonous stress of hand-feeding livestock during a devastating drought across most of Australia that broke in the early months of the pandemic.

He discovered that if he spelled the names of his favourite musical bands with grain dropped from the back of a truck that the flock would roughly adopt the same shape for several minutes.

Jackson says the heart has generated emotional social media responses.

He says “Maybe we all just need to give ourselves a big virtual hug.”

Farmer, Ben Jackson from Guyra in northern NSW, found a special way to pay tribute to his Aunty Deb Cowdery. He wasn't able to go to the funeral because of border closures.
"I feel a bit hopeless here on the farm, but I wanted to show my love somehow," Ben told The Weekly Times. pic.twitter.com/AFb3zDOJiN

— The Weekly Times (@theweeklytimes) August 25, 2021