Don’t say “baa” when you hear that, for Navajos Diné bí’ íína’ (Sheep is Life), and calls for a celebration of sheep, wool, and weaving—all of it honoring the central role of sheep in Navajo spirituality and daily life, especially the endangered breed of Navajo-Churro sheep.
These wooly animals, the first domesticated breed of sheep developed in North America by Navajo and Hispanic shepherds, are the focal point of the annual Sheep Is Life Celebration coming up June 19-20.
Event flyers explain that Diné bí’ íína’ goes beyond the basic Sheep is Life mantra—“it means the way we, the people, live. We promote a sustainable livelihood through the Navajo Way of Life, i.e., sheep—and whatever comes from that.” Residents of the Navajo Nation believe that sheep symbolize the good life, living in harmony and balance on the land.
Diné bí’ íína’ Inc.
The lamb ram sheep show class is seen here at the Sheep Is Life Celebration in 2014. This year’s celebration will be held June 19-20.
Although the terms sheep and Navajo are practically synonymous, they truly converged in 1972 with the beginning of the nucleus flock of 435 original early-generation Navajo Churros. Over the ensuing years, that flock has bounced from relocations in over a dozen sites in four different states, all under the Navajo Sheep Project motto of “Serving People, Preserving Culture.” Under the watchful eyes of llamas and Great Pyrenees guard dogs, the flock was protected from predation by coyotes, dogs, and red foxes, and today its numbers have rebounded.
Navajo-Churro are lauded on several fronts: Their meat has one-third the fat content of commercial mutton breeds; they are prolific milk producers (good for cheese making); their wool is exceptionally strong and lustrous, and comes in a variety of natural colors, which makes for strong yarns. Unlike wool from modern commercial breeds, wool from primitive carpet-wool Churros is low in lanolin and can be shorn, hand-cleaned, and spun into yarn that readily absorbs native vegetal dyes.
Diné bí’ íína’ Inc.
Some hand spun natural-dyed Navajo Churro yarn is seen at the Sheep Is Life Celebration in 2013. This year’s celebration will be held June 19-20.
Being hardy animals in an often harsh Southwestern climate, they utilize their landscape in a more ecologically-sound manner than other breeds of sheep or livestock. The Navajo-Churro is highly resistant to disease and needs little in the way of care or intervention to survive. A normal size flock watched by a single sheepherder today runs about 50 head.
Although sheepherding high in the mountains of the American West often belongs to Basque immigrants from Spain and France, even those experts learned a lot from Navajo shepherds, pastoral practitioners since sheep were recorded in the Southwest centuries ago.
Although Arizona doesn’t rate in the top 10 in total numbers of the animals, (Texas has the highest concentration of sheep and lambs) the hardy Churro breed, once considered a “scruffy and unfit” breed by the government, were nearly extirpated during a 1930s drought cycle when government agents, with no thought to sustenance value or of wool for cultural weaving, went from hogan to hogan and shot many of the sheep in front of horrified owners who regarded their animals as family members.
“The fact that these sheep still exist today is testimony to their endurance and endearment,” reports the Navajo-Churro Sheep Association. “No other sheep population in the history of the world has survived such selective pressure with such dignity and spirit.”
Diné bí’ íína’ Inc.
A Navajo Churro ewe is seen here at the Sheep Is Life Celebration in 2014. This year’s celebration will be held June 19-20.
“According to elders, it is because of this unique animal that the Navajo population increased, and looking back over our rich history, it is sad to think what it would be like without an animal so vital to our life,” reported the late Dr. Annie Dodge Wauneka, called a legendary mother of the Navajo people, and recipient of the nation’s highest civilian award, the Medal of Freedom.
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While the animals have improved their lot over the years, one thing that hasn’t changed much is the job of sheepherder. Irene Bennalley cares for bleating Churro sheep and angora goats in 9,000-foot-high meadows along the Arizona-New Mexico border.
“Sheep are like our parents,” she told ICTMN. “They feed us and give us comfort from the cold.” Bennalley, who took over the grazing permit from her aging father, is a practitioner of the traditional ways with border collies for herding and larger dogs for predator patrol. “This was the right job decision for me—physically, mentally, and spiritually. I’m more in tune now with Mother Earth.”
Diné bí’ íína’ Inc.
A group of Navajo Churro rams are seen at the Sheep Is Life Celebration in 2014. This year’s celebration will be held June 19-20.
The two-day Sheep is Life Celebration is free to the public and features loom fiber arts demonstrations along with sheep shearing, washing, carding, dying, spinning, and weaving exhibitions. It will be held on the Diné College campus in Tsaile, Arizona, along the rim of Canyon de Chelly.