Lamb Surprise

It's been a heck of a long time since I posted anything, but I thought I would jump right in with a little story from this morning on the farm. My mother is currently visiting. She came out to give me a hand with morning chores this morning. I was wearing Elliot on my back since he's just old and mobile enough to cause himself great bodily injury if left unattended in the house for more than five minutes

We'd taken care of the mule and all the goats that live up front by the house. We were out at the barn, and mom had gone out back to let the birds out when I heard a weird sound. It was the call of a sheep in distress or discomfort. I wheeled around and immediately spotted a sheep on the ground. A closer look revealed that it was Emily, one of last year's lambs, and she was pretty obviously in labor. I could just see the white tips of a newborn lamb's hooves peaking from her backside. This was a real surprise because we were pretty sure we were done lambing for the year. We figured Emily was just a bit to young to catch during breeding season. Apparently we were wrong.

As I watched, she got up and laid down again, alternately pushing and resting. I could just see the two little hooves and a nose appearing and disappearing again as she pushed. I called mom to come quick so she wouldn't miss this lamb being born. We stood and watched and waited, but momma wasn't making any progress. The stuff hanging from her backside looked suspiciously dry, like she'd been pushing quite a while. She was looking very tired, and I was pretty sure we would have a dead lamb on our hands if it had been stuck as long as I suspected.

I decided to intervene. It was pretty obvious that this lamb was trying to come out with its front legs tucked back. It's front legs and nose were trying to emerge at the same time which jams up the shoulders and makes it a lot harder for them to pass through the birth canal, also called an elbow lock. I'd seen it before in the goats. I got Elliot out of the carrier and handed him to Mom. I knew I would have to chase this ewe as she was one of our least tame ladies, and I really didn't want to stress her any more than she already was. I moved slowly and after a short chase, I was able to grab a back leg and then the rest of her. I carefully and gently laid her down on her side and used a knee to keep her from getting up and running off again.

At this point, Emily had sucked that baby back up and almost out of sight. I waited a few seconds for another contraction for the feet to emerge then slowly pulled one leg and then the other forward. It took quite a few pushes for the nose and mouth to emerge again. I hadn't felt any resistance or movement from the lamb as I pulled so I was sure we were dealing with a stillbirth at this point, but to my surprise and delight I saw that wet little nose twitch and the little tongue move! It was alive!

Momma pushed and I pulled those legs with one hand while carefully pushing back her vulva with the other. That baby was stuck but good! It took what seemed like forever, but eventually little eyes then ears emerged then the whole rest of the lamb sprung free! Momma laid flat out and closed her eyes, totally exhausted. The lamb hadn't even fully cleared her back end, but she did not care. I let her rest for a bit while that wet bundle of limbs that was the newly born lamb flopped around in the dirt trying to get it's bearings in this giant new world.

Eventually Emily came around and started talking to and cleaning her baby. Once she was on her feet, I got her and the lamb penned up in an enclosed area where no one could bother them with some fresh food and water. It was only after all was said and done that I thought to check the sex of the little one. It was a male, and a pretty one too. Dark brown with a mottled white face and small splotches of white on his body. We decided to call him Finnian. It wasn't long before he was on his feet and looking to nurse. We left mom and baby to do their thing.

That evening little Finnian was nursing great and hoping around like little fool, and mom was happy to get some extra grain and hay for all her hard work.

It occurred to me that this not the first or even the second birth that Elliot has witnessed in his short life. This kid is going to grow up knowing exactly where babies come from in very graphic detail, and I think that's pretty cool.

Louise Lambs and Rialey saves the day

Every Sunday morning, Big Onion and I with the help of Rialey, our trusty English Shepherd farm dog, gather up the entire flock of sheep a quick round of heath checks. We check and make note of FAMACA of all adults and older lambs then deworm anyone who has a low score, a poor body weight, or obvious evidence of loose stool. Right now with so many young and nursing lambs on the ground, we also check weights on all the babies to make sure they are growing at a good rate and do not have any signs of diarrhea or other issues.

Last Sunday morning, we were gathering the herd as usual. I went out with Rialey while Big Onion called the sheep while shaking a noisy can of corn. Usually we can get the entire flock into our holding area with very little stress on them or effort on our part. At this point, everyone knows the drill. This particular morning, Rialey and I had moved the flock up from the second pasture and across the bridge. We were getting ready to send them Big Onion's way when I saw movement back down the hill and heard the telltale cry of a new mother sheep. Since Big Onion seemed to have the rest of the flock under control and I knew we still had a couple of ewes ready to lamb at any minute, I called Rialey to come quietly to my side then asked her to stay with me while we went to investigate.

Crossing the bridge, I saw Louise calling and calling and torn between running to join the rest of the flock and leaving a sodden, pathetic little lamb who barely seemed to be on its feet. Back on the hill I saw a very fresh afterbirth. I was obvious that Louise had lambed very, very recently. I sent Rialey off in the opposite direction of the new mother then dropped her into a down so as not to spook her away from the lamb then slowly approached mother and child. Talking to her quietly, I scooped up the little lamb, too small and feeble to run away and tried to get Louise to follow me back across the bridge and into the first pasture.

Louise responded as mother sheep often do. She acted as though I had just performed the most amazing of magic tricks before her eyes and made that lamb disappear into thin air. Before I could blink or even drop the lamb low enough so that she could see it, she had taken off in a random direction at high speed, all the time calling her lungs out for her missing little one.

Rialey, reading the situation, swept into action and starting herding momma back towards me. With soggy lamb in hand and a distressed mother sheep darting around then being constantly redirected by the dog, all four of us eventually made our way back into the first pasture where I finally managed to get a hold on Louise's collar and shoved the lamb into her face. Magically the lamb reappeared into her reality and with my pulling, Rialey's pushing, and the drive to stay near her new offspring, we eventually got mother and child settled into a pen.

Meanwhile, poor Big Onion had been trying to handle the entire rest of the flock sans help. While we were trying to move Louise, I could hear him calling to Rialey to come and take her usual position to hold the flock in place. At the time, I made it clear to Rialey that she should disregard that order and help deal with the more pressing situation. I hoped Big Onion would understand.

Once we finally had Louise and what turned out to be her daughter firmly secured in the safety and privacy of a pen, I sent Ry around the corner to go and help her dad. Right at that moment, a much older lamb came sprinting around the corner! One of Fancy's lambs, Dakota, had seen an opening and with no dog to stop her, made a break for it!

Rialey saw the lamb then looked at me for direction. I signaled her to try and herd it back to the rest of the group, but lambs are notoriously stupid under pressure, and the confused baby just would not take direction from the dog. After dog and lamb had run in circles for a couple of minutes, I gave Rialey to go ahead to "get it." That is Rialey's command to actually use her mouth and feet to catch a runaway animal.

This is certainly not something I would trust most dogs, even well trained herding dogs, to do without causing injury to their intended target so although I trust Ry not to intentionally harm the stock, I stayed as close as I could and kept a watchful eye for her herding drive to turn to prey drive or for her to get carried away and use too much force. After the "get it" command, Rialey had immediately switched tactics and started actually putting her mouth on the lamb. At a few weeks old, that little girl had some serious speed! I watched Ry trying to grab her very gently by the elbow, never putting enough pressure to cause injury. When she'd slowed the lamb enough, she would try to put her entire mouth around the back of the lamb's neck and press it to the ground.

Dakota was particularly keen to elude capture so neither of these techniques seemed to slow her enough for me to make the catch. Finally, Rialey reached under the running lamb and grabbed the opposite elbow, this caused the lamb to stumble. While I hustled up to catch her, Rialey gave the lamb one more good nose punch in the side which rolled her right into my hands! I checked her over quickly and found that though she was winded and scared, there wasn't a scratch on that baby. Rialey had used just enough force to take her down without causing a speck of injury! What a good dog!

Dakota in hand, Rialey, the lamb, and I finally went to join Big Onion and the rest of the flock where after catching our breath, we did our usual health checks on the flock. I'm happy to report that no one needed deworming and all the lambs were showing very good increases in weight.

That job finished, we all went back to check on Louise and her new baby. I knew the baby was little when I'd originally picked her up, but when we found her to be well under 5lbs we began to suspect that she might one of twins. Big Onion, Rialey, and I made our way back out across the bridge now on a mission to search for a potentially lost little newborn lamb. Rialey paused at the afterbirth still sitting wetly on the top of the hill hoping to make a second breakfast of the farm dog delicacy, but at one word from me, she left it where it sat and started sniffing around for the missing baby.

While we stomped around the tall grass losing hope at the amount of ground we'd have to cover to try and find a tiny and potentially dead baby sheep, Ry dropped her head and took off at a run to the back pasture. I figured she was just going for a run or perhaps wanted to take a quick dip in the ponds, but when I say her floof of a curled and fluffy tail come up, then her head pop up as if to say, "Hey guys! Come look!" I knew she was onto something. It took us a minute to catch up, but when we crossed the second bridge and rounded the corner, sure enough, our trusty farm dog girl had tracked her way straight to that baby and stood waiting with her until we could gather her up and bring her back to momma! On the way back, I told Rialey she was more than welcome to enjoy that placenta she'd left behind as a reward for all her great work that morning.

This lamb was also a ewe and was bigger and much more robust than her sister. Luckily, Louise accepted both lambs, and we watched as the two little girls both nursed from their mother. Rialey then helped to clean little lamb butts while Louise got a healthy pile of grain, some fresh hay, and clean bucket of water. Finally we left mother to bond and rest with her newborns and headed up to the house for a breakfast of our own!

Lambing Season is here!

  Earlier in the evening our big, woolly ewe, Whoopi, had given birth to a ram lamb who we decided to call Degas. When we found him, he was soaking wet and looking chilly so when temps dropped into the thirties, I decided to make a late night check on him and to see if any of our other sheep had decided to lamb. Of course I had my trusty farm dog, Rialey, at my side.

  I shined a flashlight into the darkness and saw the reflection of the eyes of most of the flock standing in a bunch near the poultry pens. Scanning with my light, I caught a gleam halfway across the field near one of the rabbit tractors, then a little sparkle down close to the ground. Someone else had lambed!

  I hurried to the poultry house and flicked on the lights to see it was Bonnie standing off by herself with a little white ball of fluff on the ground at her feet. Bonnie has a history of abandoning her lambs so I knew there was no way I was going to leave her out with that little baby on a cold night.

  Swinging into action, I cleared out the milk room of some indignant lady goats and grabbed our lamb sling, a makeshift leash (half of a tie down strap) and put Rialey in a stay. I slowly tried to approach momma, but she beat hooves and headed for the rest of the flock, baby in tow. I caught up with the little one, scooped it up, and very quickly transferred it to the lamb sling.

  Sheep are funny creatures. For some reason, if you pick up a lamb, momma will have no clue what happened to her baby and start frantically searching as if the little thing had suddenly vanished into thin air. The lamb sling, a simple loop of plastic, lets the sheep see her lamb again. As long as it is held close to the ground, momma will almost always follow the lamb wherever you want. The other advantage of using the swing is lambs tend to go completely limp when carried for any length of time. It's like they are thinking, "Well, the predator has got me. Might as well die now." When you put them down after being carried, it always takes a while for them to come back to themselves. The sling keeps the babies coherent and calling for mom. Like I said, sheep are very odd creatures.

  Anyway, I got the lamb in the sling and eventually caught Bonnie's collar and with one hand secured her with the hook from the strap. With me and little lamby in the front and Rialey bringing up the rear, we were able to get mother and child safely tucked away in a cozy room. I set Bonnie up with water, hay, and a little feed then pinned her to the wall while she ate to make sure both her teats were clear and both sides of her udder were producing. All that done, I gathered baby again and found that Bonnie had had her first little girl. Using the sling and a small fish scale, I found the girl was a very respectable 8.4lbs. Later we decided on the name Dora for the girl.

  With Bonnie and her little eweling all settled in, I started to head back to the house only to realize that I hadn't yet checked on Whoopi and Degas. The little ram lamb was up and spunky. He was warm and dry with a full belly and a clean rear end. Whoopi had passed her placenta in the pen, so I called Rialey in to retrieve it (a rare and much prized treat for the farm dog) while Whoopi did her best to shield her little one from the wolf-beast and stomped for all she was worth. Ry backed her up, grabbed the placenta, and happily brought her prize back up to the house for a late night snack!

BOGO Sheep

 
  After seriously debating the future of sheep on our farm, I think we've decided to let them stick around a while longer. So far this year we've only lost one lamb, and that was from a mother who we didn't realize wasn't making milk for her little one until it was too late. Things can go south very, very quickly with newborns. Our sweet, departed Pepper's daughter Marcie (above) is doing a great job of raising her daughter, Patty. She's even passed on Pepper's smattering of speckles and extra deep voice that inspired us to call her Peppermint Patty in the first place.

 
  After initially trying to reject him, Bonnie is raising Charger into a big strapping boy with really interesting color. Charger is the first of the lambs to need worming, and Charger was the second lamb that Bonnie tried to abandon, so we'll be seriously evaluating both Bonnie and her son's future around here.

 
  And our biggest surprise this year was that Nina gave us our first set of twin lambs! She had two little girls on St. Patrick's day that we decided to call Clover and Colleen. (Sorry for the chicken photo bomb!)

She lambed very early in the morning and we were lucky enough to walk out right as she was giving birth to the second of the two little girls and get it on video:

  Nina was a good mom from the start, and you can see here that she had a very large, full udder. We were actually able to harvest a little colostrum to store away from her.

  Since she has such good mothing instincts, has given us twins, and has a wonderful stocky body type, we will probably be keeping at least one of these little girls as a breeder.

  We were doubly delighted when just a few days later Louise gave us this mismatched set! The dark brown lamb is a little ewe, and the white one a ram. We decided to call the pair Ollie and Andy respectively (any Bob's Burgers fans out there?).

  Although Maggie has been an excellent mother, Little Ollie gave us some trouble from the start. She was very small and even looks a little...off.

 
  When she was just a couple of days old, she just disappeared. It was a weekend morning, and Big Onion and I had just finished chores. We decided to take a walk out to the back pasture and check on all the new arrivals. Well, Nina was there with Clover and Colleen. Louise was there with Andy, but Ollie was not with the group. We figured she was parked somewhere sleeping. It's very common for the sheep to leave their little ones napping in a safe place while they go off to graze. Usually you will find a group of the young lambs all napping together with one mother or auntie grazing nearby.

  Since she was so young and the rest of the the flock was up and on the move, we went into search mode. Just the day before Rialey had pointed out Ollie to me sleeping safely under some of the junk in the corner of the first pasture so we figured it would be a easy matter of finding and rousing the little one then sending her back to her mother's care. Well, we looked high and low, searched all three pastures, looked under, over, and around everything.We watched the dogs for any clues. We searched in the poultry pens and even walked the banks of the creek and ponds to be sure she hadn't fallen in. When we didn't find her, we looked everywhere a second and even a third time. We spent hours that day searching. Cancelled our plans and searched some more. I gave up, but Big Onion search until it was too dark to search any more.

  Finally, we gave up concluding that she had fallen prey to some predator, maybe a fox overnight or a hawk. She was so very small. With a sigh, we did our evening chore then went inside for the night.

  The next morning, we went out to care for everyone as usual. The sheep were sleeping up in the first pasture, when they got up there was little Ollie, right there with her mother and brother like she'd never been gone in the first place! To this day we have no idea where she was for all those hours we spent searching and scouring the property. All we know is that she is WAY better than us at hide and seek, and that her name fits her quite well! Ollie, ollie, oxen freed!

Charger and Chance

  It was a chilly Monday morning and Big Onion and I were out doing chores. I was busy feeding the chickens when I saw Big Onion heading for the gate to the second pasture. He thought he'd heard the calling of a lamb and decided to investigate. Never one to be left out of the excitement, I tagged along.

 There in the middle of the second pasture all alone was this big, strong, totally dry ram lamb. He was chocolate colored so our thoughts went straight to Bonnie who had a dark colored lamb last year and abandoned him. The lamb was running around the pasture and calling with big strong lungs. Big Onion scooped him up and I called Rialey to round up the sheep to try and find who left this big guy.

  As soon as Big Onion had the lamb in hand we realized that he wasn't our only problem. There on the hill was a little pile of white fluff. When we got closer, we found another lamb. This one freshly born. She was tiny and wet and barely able to get onto her feet. I set Rialey the task of staying with the baby and getting her cleaned up while Big Onion and I rounded up the sheep and tried to find the errant mother(s).

  At first we were thinking that we had a set of twins on our hands and just one bad mom in the bunch. We got the sheep onto the bridge and confirmed that Bonnie had just given birth by the stringy bits handing from her rear end. We wrestled her into a pen with the two little lambs. It was then that we noticed that Rue had also recently given birth.

  It only made sense that the little ewe lamb was hers. We put Rue and the lamb into another empty pen and tried get the little one to nurse.

  It took forever for her to get up on her feet then even longer to figure out how and where to nurse. Finally, she got everything aligned, but she didn't seem to be getting anything. She'd nurse for a few seconds then stop. She was very hungry and very frustrated.

  We decided to check Rue's udder and found that it was small and hard. When milked, it produced a thick, yellow, waxy substance that did not resemble milk at all. Rue also showed no interest in mothering the baby lamb.

  At that point, we had two options. We could bring this little lamb in and bottle raise her, but with the house already full of six milk guzzling little goats, we were less than thrilled at the idea of adding another to the mix. The other option was to try and encourage Bonnie to take on the second lamb. If we could convince her that both lambs born so close together were hers, maybe we could avoid having another hungry mouth to feed ourselves.

  With some encouragement we were able to get the little lamb who we decided to call Chance to nurse from Bonnie. She got a full belly then settled down to nap in the hay. At that point, Bonnie had accepted her son and was allowing him to nurse. We decided to call the little boy Charger. Before we left them alone, we did see the little ewe lamb nurse from Bonnie again with little protestation on her surrogate mother's part. We left them to work things out and hoped we would come back to two happy, active, full bellied lambs at the end of the day.