Recently my sister-in-law Julie emailed that she had to "rattle her dags" to go off and do something asap. The expression, which I had never heard before, had me laughing. Of course, if sheep with dags were to run, they'd certainly rattle!
The sheep at Struan Farm rarely have rattling dags, they are kept tidy. For the uninitiated, "dags" are what accumulate on the rear ends of sheep. The fleece at the back requires regular trimming, or "crutching" so that flies, etc. don't breed. This is done apart from, and more regularly, than shearing. Dags trimmed off sheep are actually quite good to put on the garden, you can imagine why..
But where I start to get confused on all this dag stuff is with another expression: "he's such a dag!" As used, this is meant to be a compliment. I wouldn't think the scraps off a sheep's back end would be a good thing particularly, would you? So I did a bit of research, and it does mean that someone is funny in a nice way, and doesn't relate back to sheep dags. Guess we've all learned something!
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