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The Shepherds of Zagatala

By LOCKIE GARY, Hardee County Extension Director, Livestock Specialist

Sleep would not come during my first night in Baku. It had nothing to do with 48 hours of travel from Miami to this capital city. I recognized my insomnia as excitement. My dream had come true. I was back in Azerbaijan for my fourth Farmer to Farmer volunteer assignment sponsored by Land O' Lakes through a U.S. Agency for International Development grant.

Scope of Work/ Seminars
For the next three weeks ( 3/16-4/5/02) my assignment would be to travel by Jeep to Zagatala, a rayon (district) of about 20,000 people in the far northern portion of the country near the Russian border. I would be responsible for training the veterinary staff in protocol for immunizing against foot and mouth disease and anthrax as well as deworming 15,000 head of sheep/goats and 1,000 head of buffalo/cattle.

My interpreter would again be Vugar Ahmedov. We had worked together before on a previous assignment and I knew Vugar to be so much more than an interpreter. He was young and athletic and served as my protector and livestock assistant. He would again show the courage necessary to work with buffalo and large dairy bulls on farms without electricity and no means to restrain the livestock except our ropes and the first available tree. He would display the patience and tact necessary to weave through the maze of bureaucracy (twelve government departments) necessary for us to secure permission to obtain our deworming medicine from customs officials. Despite the interminable delays and 'red tape' among these bureaucrats, this was a very necessary part of my assignment in this former Soviet Republic.

Our driver, Sanan Teymurov, was new to me but proved to be a great asset. Driving in rural Azerbaijan is just plain dangerous. Most of the back roads to the remote villages in Zagatala are either straight up or straight down and there are many potholes without bottoms. It is best to travel with at least two spare tires and forget about traveling at night!

We would recruit Sanan to keep records for us as we ear tagged each animal and set up record keeping systems at each farm so that we would not vaccinate or deworm an animal twice. Sanan would receive detailed instructions on how to take fecal samples from the livestock for sampling purposes, but he declined to have his picture taken doing so, as he was very proud to be introduced as our driver.

We conducted three seminars in Zagatala before trekking to the surrounding farms. The first was for veterinarians only. We spent a full day looking at slides and veterinary equipment used to vaccinate and deworm livestock. We discussed principles of livestock health and disease control and strategic deworming. We also used live animals for demonstrating different procedures.

The all-male veterinary corps was extremely attentive and appreciative of the instruction and gifts of tools and equipment. These men have been well trained in veterinary academics but have not had hands-on instruction in many cases due to a lack of basic equipment.
The 22 veterinarians completing the instruction were to become good friends and excellent help in the days ahead as we packed into remote camps to assist and instruct farmers. They were eager to fecal sample the livestock and identify worm larvae and count eggs with a real microscope.

They were a little reserved about testing older bulls, especially buffalo bulls for trichomoniasis, a venereal disease which causes infertility and abortion in cattle. This is because it is a painful process which requires restraining the bull and we did not have a squeeze chute. I assured them we could throw the bulls and restrain them with ropes.

The second seminar was hosted just for farmers. Many of these shepherds and livestock owners were known to me as I had visited their villages on two previous assignments. It was like a 'homecoming' for me as we greeted each other and exchanged gifts.
Narizov Suleyman was so excited to see me that he grabbed me by the ears and dragged me partly through the truck window to kiss me on each cheek.

These men had formed a Livestock Association with 52 members and had assembled 47 men for the seminar. We again spent a full day describing deworming strategies, learning how to drench sheep and cattle and how to find worms in fresh manure samples. These hardened men from unpronounceable villages such as Talabinalaar, Gozbarakh, Mamrukh and Chardakhlar had little interest in differentiating worms under a microscope but when they were instructed in the care and handling of syringes and vaccines they couldn't wait for us to visit their village.

So many times I had to fight back tears as they told me of how they had dreamed of a day like this when they could receive instruction on how to care for their livestock.

Many of these men were refugees from the war with Armenia. If they were not refugees they had refugees living with them whom they had taken into their homes. Many of these people whom the government refers to as IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons) were not engaged in production agriculture before the war. They may have been cooks or bookkeepers but now they were resorting to pastoral agriculture just to feed their families.

Many had made great sacrifices and traveled overnight by foot or horseback just to come to hear the instruction. Land O' Lakes had sent couriers ahead of us to announce the time and location of the seminars and had furnished a portable generator to produce electricity to run our slide projector.

A third instruction was given at a Veterinary Laboratory to a Field Officer and his staff of two female technicians. They were without even a stove in a cold, dark building with no equipment or supplies.

We provided training in fecal egg counting and gave them supplies and gifts. It was gratifying to see these people smile. They were so desirous of doing a good job but simply had no equipment to do so.

The Director of the laboratory was so proud of a 1935 Russian microscope he had salvaged. As I examined it I discovered it was lacking an eyepiece.

Country Overview
Azerbaijan is a country of 8 million and is bordered by Russia on the north, Armenia and Georgia on the west, Iran on the south, and the Caspian Sea on the east. It also shares a tiny, nine kilometer border with Turkey.

Its population is mostly ethnic Azeri, a Turkic nationality that speaks a language closely related to Turkish (though Russian is also widely spoken, especially in the capital), and is primarily Muslim, although Azerbaijan is a secular state.

While Azerbaijan has been under either Persian or Russian rule for much of the past few centuries, and was one of the fifteen Soviet Republics, it did briefly exist as an independent state between 1918 and 1920. When the USSR dissolved in 1991, it recaptured its independence.

War with Armenia in the early 1900's resulted in that country's occupation of about 20% of Azerbaijani territory and at least 1.1 million internally-displaced Azeris (IDPs). Although a cease fire has been in effect for several years, and peace talks are on-going, there is little optimism about the situation being resolved any time soon.Baku is a city of 1.8 million and is the political and economic center of Azerbaijan. Due to its purported oil and natural gas wealth, Azerbaijan is home to dozens of international companies, most of which are based in Baku.

Agricultural Overview
With the breakup of the Soviet Union and the initiation of economic reforms in Azerbaijan, most of the state-owned dairy farms went through a process of privatization whereby the herds were distributed to individuals.

In addition, the dissolution of the larger kolhoz and sovhoz dairy herds into smaller, privately managed herds interrupted the marketing channels for both raw milk and meat products, as well as the functioning of the animal health protection systems.

While many farmers do not have any knowledge in the areas of herd management or addressing parasites or contagious diseases, veterinary services (where they exist at all) are in most cases too expensive for subsistence farmers to use.

Farmers, therefore, must rely on traditional veterinary medicine practices, which are a poor substitute and may even present the danger of improper treatment.

Livestock Production
According to the State Statistical Committee of Azerbaijan, livestock production today is only 41% of what it was before the breakup of the Soviet Union. Seventy percent of the food is imported while almost 50% of the population is involved in production agriculture. This critical production shortfall has been a result of several factors including the privatization of land, lack of credit for farming, the refugee situation (one in seven Azeris are refugees) and lack of agricultural technology and improved livestock production techniques.

Cattle, sheep and buffalo are grazed on public lands. There are no fences for dividing herds or flocks or separating herds of different owners.

In almost every village the routine is as follows: the one or two milk cows per family are milked early and turned out onto the street where the men and older boys lead the herd to pasture in the surrounding hills. These large herds are composed of sheep, goats, dairy cows, buffalo, and horses. I have seen many herds of 1500-2000 head. Everyone shares in the cost of hiring someone to watch over the herd.
There are always several large Caucasian sheep dogs present to protect the livestock. These dogs do not work the herd but serve only as protection against wolves, bears and uninvited guests. These dogs are treated harshly in many cases. Their ears are cropped soon after birth so that predators will not have a handle to grab.

The herd is moved over the pastures and watered as needed. Some sheep are paint branded on the dock to signify ownership. The herd is returned to the village at night, coming down the main road. Villagers living along the main road simply call to or sing to their livestock and their animals file out of the herd and into the owner's gate.

Those living off the main road call out to their livestock and usually their animals with few exceptions will follow them home. School age children will commonly handle this chore in the evenings.

Absolutely no grazing management is practiced because no one owns the land. Consequently, most of the pastureland is severely over grazed and there is unnecessary erosion. There are no restrictions regarding the number of animals or how long they are allowed to graze an area.

In remote desert areas the sheep are brought into a fold at night. The folds are made of stone and are about 12-15 feet high to keep out predators. They are accessed by a ramp. After penning the sheep and goats the horses are hobbled inside the pen near the entrance and fleeces and bedrolls are spread on the ground while the cooks build a fire and start dinner, usually consisting of lamb or mutton kebobs. While dinner is being prepared the sheep and goats are milked to provide cheese.

The milk is fermented in goatskins which are churned by hand in wooden churns or hung from a saddle to insure agitation. I ate lots of this soft cheese and even came to rely on it after several weeks in the field.