A North Tyneside farmer is evidently unaware of the extensive research which has been dedicated to probing the delicate matter of ovine homosexuality, and has dismissed clear evidence of his flock indulging in boy-on-boy as a simple bit of rough and tumble

The rams in question, in Dudley, near Cramlington, had been marked with a fetching blue dye which "gets transferred to a ewe during intercourse so the farmer can tell which female could be pregnant", as the Beeb puts it.

However, while the ewes do indeed show a tinge of blueness, all of the rams ended up covered from snout to dags in ultramarine. Their owner, who wisely "did not want to be named", offered: "They get a bit bored before they get let out and start fighting with each other. That's how they start covering each other in blue dye, while the ewes just get a bit of blue on their backs."

He concluded: "If you look closely, the all-blue ones are the daddies."

Hmmm. A likely story. The BBC has a nice snap of some all-blue daddies and a lone, largely unmolested ewe here. ®

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