They’re back and they’re hungry for more.

Sheep have returned to East Campus near the Oconee River to continue their tasty task of clearing invasive plant species.

Kevin Kirsche, director of the Office of Sustainability, said the idea of using sheep to control invasive plants is an idea that has been around for years.

Students and members of the community were invited to interact with the sheep on East Campus on Monday. The sheep are on campus for the second time this semester to help clear invasive plant species. Photo by Kathryn Ingall | The Red & Black

“The reason why now is that it dovetails nicely with an agro-forestry conference on campus this summer,” he said. “Bringing in the sheep is an on-site research project that will be referenced during that conference.”

Among the questions researchers will investigate is the effectiveness of this method.

The sheep come from a farm in Madison, owned by local shepherd Jennif Chandler who has been farming sheep for more than 20 years.

“I really like sheep, and I do believe that sheep are a wonderful asset,” she said.

The sheep will primarily be removing privet, an invasive shrub that prevents the growth of native species.

Unlike heavy machinery, sheep do not compact the soil and damage tree roots.

Kirsche said the sheep have attracted a lot of interest on campus among both students studying land management and curious passersby.

“We just saw the sheep and we wondered where the sheep came from,” said Maneezheh Bamdad, a junior science education major as she and a group of friends stopped by to investigate the sheep.

Zach Richardson, a fourth-year landscape architecture major, came out to the event to help clear brush to make way for the sheep.

He is also working on a class project to use goats in a similar way to clear areas of invasive plants.

“I used to live in East Campus and I used to bike past this area,” Richardson said. “That’s part of why I was excited about it because I had wanted to put goats on it.” Richardson and Chandler shared ideas for spreading the concept throughout the community.

“Everywhere I go I think, ‘If only we could do this, if only we could do that,’” Chandler said.

Chandler said she sees a future for using sheep as a way to maintain landscaping, especially for large industrial areas.

“In the future as landscaping becomes more and more expensive, this will be an important environmentally-friendly alternative,” she said. “They need to plan ahead instead of spending all that money on landscaping.”