EVEN on his final day, champion sheep breeder Joe Brown still went round the fields to check his flock.

Not even failing health in the months before his death, aged 75, could keep him from his beloved Swaledales.

For Mr Brown, one of the region's great farming characters, even bought an electric buggy so he could drive round the fields of his farm in Teesdale, County Durham.

During this year's lambing season he stayed up many a night watching his Swaledale ewes giving birth on a closed- circuit television system, rigged up by his son, Ivan.

If he saw a new-born lamb in difficulty in the early hours he would wake his wife, Joan, and ask her to bring it indoors so he could care for it at Mount Pleasant Farm at Bowes, near Barnard Castle.

Ivan said yesterday: "Even on the last day of his life he drove round the fields to look at his sheep. He knew them all individually and treated them like members of his family. He really loved them."

Mr Brown won prizes and titles at shows all over the region over the years, and had already entered five sheep for a big event at Penrith, in Cumbria, on July 24.

They will still appear before the judges under his name.

One of his daughters, Linda, said: "Dad loved going round all the shows and sheep sales. We mean to enter some of his flock in his name at several events during the autumn, so hopefully he will still be winning some prizes."

His son Kenneth, said: "Dad said recently that he had lived his life to the full. He certainly did. He was a wonderful character who was liked everywhere. There weren't many people who knew more about Swaledale sheep than him."

Mr Brown was born in Gateshead but fell in love with the countryside when he and his brother, Arthur, were evacuated to Swaledale during the war.

He returned to Tyneside but after school went back to the dales to start farm work.

He is survived by Joan, four sons, three daughters, eight grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

His other children are David, Keith, Susan and Margaret.

His funeral will be held tomorrow, at 11.30am, at St Giles Parish Church, in Bowes.