Helmut Strohschien is glad to have the unsightly ungulate removed from Williams Lake but in the meantime he had a little fun with it on Facebook.
A picture of the dead creature on the social networking site was nicknamed eweboat and Strohschien quipped the sheep had gone off to ewetopia.
All joking aside, Strohschien says the animal — identified later as a sheep — was removed from the lake on Tuesday morning.
When Strohschien was contacted by the Tribune on Monday he said he was having trouble getting any agency to respond to the situation.
A call to the Interior Health Authority had officials expressing concern and indicating the health authority would be willing to work with another agency to have the situation resolved. On Tuesday it enlisted the assistance of the City, which removed the sheep.
In an interview, IHA’s Dr. Paul Hasselback revealed that the dead animal was not a particular concern for the community’s drinking water that comes from wells deep below the lake and that swimmers should not be concerned by the carcass’s presence as it does not contribute any more bacteria to the water than is already there.
“I’m just glad its gone,” said Strohschein. “It (the location) was in a tourist area of town to a certain extent ... when you get cars and buses of people coming down to Scout Island,” he said, adding that he felt badly for the farmer who had lost the animal.