‘Ovinaphobia’ Is A Fear Of Sheep – Or What You’ll Experience Watching This Video

Sheep up close staring at camera

iStockphoto / MasikaFotos


The state of Wyoming is having a moment due in part to the success of Yellowstone driving tourism in record numbers to the Cowboy State. While it is one of the most naturally gorgeous places on the planet, those tourists are finding there isn’t a whole lot going on in Wyoming after arriving.

To give you a sense of how sparsely populated Wyoming is let’s take a look at the numbers. Wyoming ranks dead last (50 out of 50) in state population with just 580,000+ residents. New York City has a population of roughly 15x the size of Wyoming.

One area where Wyoming is punching above its weight is ‘most sheep per capita’. Wyoming ranks #1 in the United States (1 out of 50) for most sheep per capita. There is an estimated 355,000 head of sheep in Wyoming, or 6.81% of all the sheep in the USA. That’s approximately 0.61 sheep per person in Wyoming.

Suffice it to say that Ovinaphobia, or ‘a fear of sheep’, isn’t very common in Wyoming. But Ovinaphobia (a fear of sheep) is really the only/best way to describe this viral video below. It’s a so-called “traffic jam” in Wyoming where hundreds of sheep swarm the road making it impassable:

I’ve driven through the English countryside extensively and have never experienced anything like that in my life. Those sheep own the road. They own it.

The winter in Wyoming is as inhospitable as anywhere in the United States and those sheep have no time for anyone suffering from Ovinaphobia. They’re all about getting from point A to point B. No dillydallying to be had.

While the chances that a human dies from sheep-related causes are slim, the odds are never 0%. In fact, a study looked at 20 years worth of data and found 3 instances of ‘fatal ovine interactions’, or sheep-related deaths in humans.

Be careful out there, fellas.

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