In the chilly darkness just before sunrise, a sleepy-eyed Josh Adams reported for his shift on ewe patrol at New Mexico State University's animal farm. He buttoned his canvas jacket and walked down the dirt lane to the sheep barn. Soon another student arrived, checked her flashlight and moved through corral gates toward the heifer pens. At this ebony hour the only sounds on the west side of campus were the clanging of the gates and the drone of trucks on the interstate. In both the sheep and beef production classes, student teams are drawn at the beginning of the semester.
Some faculty members find it difficult to relate textbook teachings to the real world.
But in NMSU's animal science department, professors combine classroom instruction with life and death experience. Students do a good job when on duty. They're conscientious and observant and it makes a difference to overall productivity to have 600 eyes instead of six watching the flock. Adams moved around the outside pens, the white vapor of his breath rising and mingling with that of the sheep and dissipating in the frosty night. He looked for signs of labor, a ewe pawing at the ground, neck arched, straining to deliver a lamb.