Minus Ten And Of Course Another Lamb is Born

Naturally Lamby (very imaginative name huh?) picked today to have her lamb. It was minus ten when I awoke. Tom had checked the gals at 5am so she must have had the little black ram lamb between then and 9am. The lamb was all cleaned off and barely shivering so I figured she probably had her first drink. But this ewe had twins last year and they both were dead the next day. So even though we figured those lambs were getting milk, they obviously weren't. They didn't cry and appeared to be ok. I wasn't taking any chances this time and she is my second oldest sheep, so I got mama and baby and moved them into the jug. That wasn't easy without help. The jug is the small pen where lamb and mom can bond away from the rest of the gang. I flipped the ewe, which also is not easy to do alone, and tried to attach the lamb to a teat. The lamb wasn't too cooperative so I expressed milk from both teats into a cup, and gave it to the lamb with a syringe. He perked up right away and stood up. I noticed that one teat was much fuller than the other. So again I wondered if the lamb had taken a drink from just one side.

I will have photos tomorrow of the little guy. He has his dad's smaller ears and the shorter tail. I will have to keep an eye on him all day. The temp is supposed to go up to a whopping 25 degrees! But the sun is out.

So now I have had three lambs, all singles. Whatever happened to twins? I was told by a fellow shepherd that everyone is complaining of singles this year. That perhaps it is a bad omen that a drought is coming this year. If you are a shepherd reading this, are you experiencing a larger number of singles this year? And Albert was a little late getting romantic with these ewes and usually the majority of them have had their lambs by now. My guess is he missed their first cycle. Maybe I need to seek out some sheep lingerie to get him interested earlier!

For a short stroll down memory lane, here is a lamb pic from last year.