Shepherd with traditional landsheep breeds

The community first of all consists of the forty shepherds, of whom 26 joined the Guild. They work with site management organisations like the Nature Conservation Foundation, the Forestry Commission, provincial and private site managers and authorities. The shepherds sometimes have trainees or aspirant-shepherds in training and volunteers work with the flocks as well. The public that is recreating within the grazing area is an important part of the community.

Sheep have been kept for many ages already in the Netherlands. Because of the good quality of their manure, the sheep flocks were deployed to graze farmland and sandy areas. The manure was subsequently used to improve the farmland and agricultural areas. Most shepherds used to be bound to a village or community from which they daily guided their flocks to the heath. As of the sixteenth century, deep litter barns were to be in use, where the flocks could stay overnight and during the winter. A nice detail is the recommendation in a book from 1835, to go west with the flock in the morning and to east in the evening  –against the direction of the sun – thus allowing the sheep to keep their heads out of the warm sun. An exceptional thing was that in the nineteenth century large flocks moves from the Peel to the markets in Paris and even London. In the first half of the twentieth century the long tradition came virtually to an end, due to the number of clearings, reparcelling of the landscape and the use of other fertilisers. In the sixties and seventies of the last century a movement arose, from a touristic point of view, to safeguard the flocks. And some time later on ecology played a role, raising the interest for deploying the flocks for heath management. Grazing companies deploy a shepherd as a seasonal worker, without a connection to the grounds and with flocks of different compositions. The shepherd who work in the traditional way want to stop this trend.

2019-2023

• Stimulate the creation of more heathland farms as sales points for shepherds' merchandise.
• Talk to TBOs about an enlightened tendering regime so that shepherds of the guild have a greater chance.
• Join a larger lobby (LTO) towards The Hague to participate in discussions about the plans for changes in nature policy
• Convince the Helicon shepherd training in Velp to include the story of the traditional shepherds and traditional heath farming in the training or to tell the story about it to the students.
• Draw attention to the usefulness of the landscapes from various studbooks.
• Enter into partnerships with TBOs: Provincial Landscapes, Natuurmonumenten, Staatsbosbeheer, private owners.
• Look for more (traditional) shepherds via eg Helicon.
• Lobby for better financing, possibly possibilities from the new CAP (Common Agricultural Policy) from Europe. The Netherlands should make more applications for this and open it up to Dutch shepherds. Try to achieve this in consultation with the LTO.
• Arrange official recognition for sheep shepherds, a matter of patience.
• Provide support and advice to shepherds when entering into a tender. Find an organization or specialist who would like to take care of this.