Fergal Mc Nally Takes Q Radio By Storm
J3 Pupil Fergal Mc Nally was interviewed by the popular brodcaster Rowan Hand on Saturday morning at Q Radio. He was accompanied by his Science teacher Ms Chambers. Fergal did the College proud once again and continues to be a popular catch for various media outlets who wish to hear of his agricultural innovation.
In Fergal's project at the BT Young Scientist Competition in Dublin last week project video evidence and behavioural analysis were used to see how sheep flocked and scattered away from a range of threatening stimuli approaching the sheep.
Results illustrated that sheep scattered in flock formation when approached by a stranger whereas the sheep ran towards the farmer when approached by them. When there were two strangers approaching the sheep the flocking was more immediate and intense. As sheep are normally capped or moved by two or more people this can be correlated with the sheep associating two people with predatory stress and as such they have developed a survival strategy of flocking. In an investigation with both a stranger and a sheepdog the sheep are more aware of the dog and this enables the stranger to approach the sheep and resulted in a delay in flocking in response to the stranger. If the variable of the stranger is changed to a farmer with a dog, when the dog makes a predatory move the sheep immediately followed the farmer’s instruction due to the bond developed between the farmer and his sheep. It is proposed that farmers do not use dogs in lambing season due to the stress that could be induced by the dogs.
Moreover, when sheep were fed meal only once prior to the investigation the sheep responded immediately by running towards both the farmer and stranger alike as they entered the field separately with the meal. This illustrates the addictive affect of meal as the sheep show no fear of the person who is feeding them meal. Hence farmers could use meal to tame feral sheep from that were in remote and mountainous area during summer grazing seasons.