Hey there, Our lambies are doing so well. Freckles is such a great mama, both lambies are even starting to play with mama's food and sniff the water bucket. They bounce around a lot!!! And we've been watching Brownie really closely and we were putting her up in a shed at night to keep her safe if she delivered. But she didn't. Then Saturday her rear turned really pink and her belly had dropped, so we put her back in the shed. By Sunday morning, nothing, so we let her out for breakfast only to notice that contractions had started. So rather than confining her to the shed, we put her in the pen I built for Freckles and her lambs, about 10x30. She paced a lot and finally picked a spot to settle in, well she kept getting up and down, but she stayed there. We watched for a while and went inside for a late breakfast. We kept checking on her and finally at 1pm, we saw a wet lamb wobbling around!!!! We ran out to watch. A short while later 2 balloons come out and then comes the 2nd lamb. We were so scared because we didn't see hooves. I ran (well hobbled, got bit by our male hog on Friday) for the book and by the time I got back, the 2nd lamb was born. Jon said he was getting real scared because there was a lot of neck for a long time, but the lamb kept moving along, so he stayed back. Then finally the lamb came rushing out!!!!. Brownie immediately went to work cleaning him up and we watched. It is so extremely hard to watch the lambs struggle to stand up without interfering!!!!!! But we didn't and he did!!! Then we waited in case there was a 3rd and for #2 to get his first few drinks of milk. No more, so we rushed them off to the shed for their bonding days. Both were ram lambs!! Can you believe it??? What are the odds of 5 out of 5 lambs being boys??? But they are soooo cute and both of Brownies are black with white foreheads. The second one has a star on the forehead with a bar above it, so Jon has already named him The General. Thanks for all your help. Next sets shouldn't be till spring time. Now we get to enjoy 4 tiny ram lambs. Thank you, Marion
The odds of getting ram lambs is directly inverse to your desire for ewe lambs. Its a good thing to not interfere with lambing, however with a quiet ewe it won't hurt to get your hands mucky and feel what's coming and how, so you'll know what to expect. You shouldn't rush a birth but don't be afraid of helping either. Watching is good too. Are you stripping out the waxy plug to clear the teat and check for milk?
My fifth and last lamb was born Monday the 8th. She was the only female. Just wasn't a good year for females.
Yes, I've been stripping out the teats. I did both on Freckles, but only checked one on Brownie because the other was clearly working, plus the one I checked was working fine. Both lambs are getting good milk from Brownie and I may put them in with Freckles and her 2 lambies today, or wait till tomorrow, I haven't decided. The white lamb from Freckles was escaping the lamb pen today, so cute, he was running around checking out all the big sheep and chasing the guineas. Since we have 2 horses and 3 rams, we don't think it wise to let the lambs run with them yet, we're too worried the horses will step on them without knowing it, like they do with chickens. Mouse
Cute, we had a little twin that would escape from her lambing pen. Drove her mum nutz while she beetled about checking all the other pens etc. So we named her Beetle, a rare honor to get a name here.
Congrats! Wish you had a ewe lamb or 2 though! Do you have anymore ewes yet to lamb? I too would be worried about the lambs with the horses. My mare kicked a boer goat doeling the other day because the mare wanted the goats grain. Horses, as you probably well know, get a little playful sometimes too and chase smaller animals. 3 of ours were chasing my dog today...the poor dog was petrified and frozen in place...we had to to get her. She's quite a wimp though...took her a LONG time to willingly go outside after she was first shocked by the electric fence. I can't wait for our lambing in mid-late february. I expect 23 ewes to lamb then, and then 8 to lamb later in the year. June was our first experience with lambing...we sat in the shed for hours just watching the ewes. A couple needed assisting, as the ewes were lambing for the first time, and the lambs seemed to have pretty big heads like my ram. The ewes just got so exhausted, and they were no longer making progress. Once the head was out, they did fine on their own, and the 2nd of a set of twins always came out easily. Do you still have internal parasites now where you are living, or is it frozen? We learned that hard way that having lambs means a high worm load in the ewe (or a lower resistance to worms). We wormed at lambing and every three weeks after, and I still had a ewe died from the parasites 7 weeks after she lambed. Strangely, we had no problem with worms in the lambs. If you have any reason to suspect there may be internal prasites still active, you should definitely worm your ewes.
Yeah, I wish we had a few ewe lambs out of this batch, but that's ok. We have 10 other ewes who seem to be in various stages of pregnancy. One of our horses is quite playful, at least we hope he's playing, it's almost time for him to be gelded. Yes, we have tons of internal parasites, not enough freezing yet here. We wormed the ewes a few weeks ago and their breed is supposedly parasite resistant, but we will definitely keep on top of it. Thanks for the advice. All 4 lambs are doing so well, they're playing all together and I even saw 2 going head to head, so cute when they're this little.
Nice to hear about your new little ones! My three pregnant ewes just keep getting bigger and bigger! I have no idea when they're due, but they're Barbados Blackbelly sheep, and supposed to do fine. It's -8 degrees tonight already at dinnertime, though, and I hope it's not tonight. Rosemary
Hi Mouse, What kind of sheep do you have that are parasite resistant? Are they Gulf Coast Native? We are in Southern Missouri and we are looking for a few Gulf Coast Native sheep. Couldn't afford to keep worming our other sheep all the time.
Hi, The parasite resistant sheep are Barbados Blackbelly sheep. They are hair sheep. Here is a link to their breed: http://www.ansi.okstate.edu/breeds/sheep/barbadosblackbelly/index.htm Also, here's a site for breeders http://www.awrittenword.com/listserv/breeder/map.html Mouse
