Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Lambing has begun!

The first of our 2011 spring lambs was born this afternoon. Bo delivered a set of twins, unfortunetly only one of them made it. She had a ram and ewe lamb again, both black this time but the ewe lamb didn't survive. We're not exactly sure what happened b/c somehow she managed to lamb in between Frank and I checking on her. The ewe lamb was still mostly in her sack with only the head out when we found her so we're not sure if she was born alive and got too cold or if something happened during the birth and she wasn't born alive. I guess it doesn't really matter at this point- I don't know that there was anything that we could have done unless we had been there at the birth. So far #6 (the ram lambs designation- can you believe he's our 6th lamb already!!!) has been doing well. You forget how tiny they are when they are born- tiny and gangly. Lambs are just all legs! We've moved Mary into her lambing jug b/c we suspect she will be the next to deliver. When she was outside she didn't look that big but in the jug she looks simply enormous! She definitely has multiples in there- maybe even triplets again. Mary has historically been a more attentive mother than Bo so its not a bad things for her to be having multiples. Bo is just kinda flighty when it comes to her babies! We're not sure if any of the yearling ewe lambs are bred or not. You'd think it would be easy to tell if a sheep was pregnant but with all their winter wool on they are so fluffy that especially if they just have a single baby it is really hard to tell sometimes until just before they deliver! I guess we'll find out soon enough! Pictures to come...

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