This Is What It Looks Like When A Sheep Doesn’t Get Sheared For Years

Sheep should be sheared at least once a year, not every half-decade, like poor Chris. He went missing in Australia, and according to a local shearer, “I don’t reckon he’s been shorn before and I reckon he’d be 5 or 6 years old.” Chris was rescued yesterday by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), the chief executive of which told WAVY, “When we first brought him in yesterday, he was really shy, he was shaking, he would move his head away from people and he could barely get up and walk.” You’d have a hard time getting around, too, if you were carrying 89 pounds of wool on your body, which is how much was clipped off Chris.

That’s a possible world record.

Tammy Ven Dange, chief executive of the Canberra RSPCA, which rescued the merino ram dubbed Chris, said she hoped to register the 40.45 kilogram (89-pound, 3-ounce) fleece with the Guinness World Records.

“He’s looking really good, he looks like a new man,” Ven Dange said, as the now 44-kilogram (97-pound) sheep recovered at the Canberra animal refuge. “For one thing, he’s only half the weight he used to be.” (Via WAVY)

Once Chris recovers (on top of everything else, he had skin burns from pee getting caught in his fleece, a scenario that will join my rotation of nightmares), he’ll find a new home, where he’ll be properly taken care of. Possibly after befriending a talking pig.

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