This is not to clean the sheep it’s to get rid of parasites that can irritate the sheep and cause a lower quality of wool. Imagine it like shampoo for lice.
This seems like a much more humane application than others I’ve seen. There’s one where they lock a couple dozen in a cage that’s barely big enough for them to move with the top just barely above their heads, then they slowly drop the whole cage in to a pool of the liquid until they’re fully submerged, and then hold them there for like 60 seconds before slowly raising it back up.
It's definitely more like 5-10 seconds. But I get it, it does feel like a loooong time for an animal to be underwater. 60 seconds would definitely kill a panicked sheep or cow. It's called a plunge dip!
If they don’t, they will cough the inhaled water out when the cage goes back up. That’s they time it at 60 seconds, really hard to suffocate so quickly.
I have friends who fill super soakers with ivermectin and they just shoot their cows and horses. Mostly for fun, but apparently it works. I imagine it wouldn't work on a sheep though because of their wooly coat
That’s how my father in law used to dip his sheep, they were driven through a concrete pit and I remember helping him to dunk the sheep under to make sure they were fully covered. Sheep didn’t seem to mind it, I guess much better than being attacked by insects.
Its definitely not for 60 seconds lol, that would be a good way to drown your sheep, done right it should only be a few seconds that the water is over their heads, just long enough to saturate their wool.
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u/Technical-Prize-4840 5h ago
It might just be the color of wet wool, but they look whiter/cleaner going in than they do coming out to me.