New Zealand mourns death of shaggy icon Shrek

NEW Zealanders were mourning the loss of the country’s most famous sheep yesterday, a shaggy national icon named Shrek who was renowned for avoiding being shorn for years.

Shrek captured the public’s imagination in 2004 after he evaded the annual shearing roundups for the previous seven years by hiding in caves on his farm on the South Island. When finally found, he was clad in an astonishing 60 pounds (27 kilograms) of wool.

That’s about five times a typically annual shearing from Shrek’s breed, the Merino sheep prized for some of the softest wool.