Sheep are stoic animals that mask pain effectively, making recognition and treatment of painful conditions challenging and often delayed in farming settings.
The stoicism of sheep creates a welfare trap: animals in significant pain continue to behave relatively normally because displaying weakness would be evolutionarily disadvantageous. Farmers who cannot recognise pain fail to treat it, and animals suffering from foot rot, mastitis, or injury continue in pain for days or weeks longer than necessary. Training stockpeople to recognise subtle pain indicators — changes in posture, ear position, weight bearing, and facial expression — dramatically improves treatment rates. The availability of validated pain assessment tools and effective analgesics means there is no technical barrier to excellent sheep pain management, only awareness and access barriers.