The third clun had her lambs this morning, just as Monique showed up for the morning chores. This is my favorite clun. I call her Sadie. Monique calls her Baldy. Tulip, The Pest, took most the fleece off her neck because she was always covered with alfalfa. Tulip is the self appointed neck cleaner. I keep expecting her to hurk up a hairball someday.
Sadie the Bald with her twins. One ewe lamb & one ram lamb. These are quite flattering pictures of her, you cannot see the massive bald spot on the back of her neck & head.
The little ewe lamb looks like Mom, with dark legs. Her face is speckled. The little ram lamb has some speckling but will have his coopworth father's coloring more so than mom.
Most of the clun/romney ewes have had light colored lambs, with some brown speckling. The clun's father was a black romney, the mothers were all purebred cluns. I really like these sheep. They work nicely, on top of having great shape & muscling. Good mothers too.
Here is the clun and her lambs that Monique saved the day by pulling. The first lamb was MASSIVE. Her lambs are light colored like their father an AI Coopworth ram.
The clun with the triplets is finally starting to call to her lambs. I let her out of the jug today with Fred. She is a wee bit worried about Fred in the lamb pen. She calls to him while I feed him, sniffing him, and talking to him. When I am done feeding him he stuffs his head under her tummy and tries to suck on her leg. He is none to smart. But Mom wants him and I am going to keep him with her and just supplement him until he gets his head screwed on straight, if ever. He will be moved to the bucket shortly.
He is finally sleeping with his siblings.
Today Grace helped me feed him.
I do not pick him up when I feed him, but Grace needed a lamb snuggle this morning. Who could resist?
One of the ewes escaped the lamb pen with her lamb this morning. Grace really impressed me in helping to get them back in. She was turning away when necessary, putting pressure where she needed all on her own. A shepherd in the making.
Yesterday I let Jim into the lamb pen for the first time. He is in love. He watches the lambs like they are creatures put on the earth only for his amusement.
The lambs are exploring and being....lambs. This ewe lamb loves to climb to the top of the wood pile and leap off.
Maimie's triplets are all growing equally well. She is an excellent mom, constantly counting her lambs. This one lay down in the straw, fell asleep. When she saw how close I got with my iPhone, she was quite angry. After I backed away she went up to the lamb, nudged him with her nose and chewed him out.
I had a tagging disaster with the ewe lamb the other day. I thought I had killed her. There was blood EVERYWHERE. Apparently I hit the major vein in the ear. I had to take the tag out and tried to stop the bleeding. I thought I had it stopped but when Monique stopped by in the evening she had dislodged the scab and it looked like a lamb was slaughtered in the jug. Monique put a pressure dressing on it and got the bleeding stopped. You can still see blood on her ear in the photo below.
We are going to start banding tails here soon. God help me if I do that wrong. I would much prefer to remove them quickly through the cut and cauterize technique. Although the machine required to do it is expensive, thus we have to use the rubber bands. It just makes me shudder to think about having an appendage dry up and rot off. Ouch. Testicles too. Double ouch.
Moving on...
Since we only have Sherman and 3 silly mindless lambs to work right now I have had to stick to driving. Putting them in the new pasture has livened things up a bit, creating new draws & pressures. Brynn has been loving it.
The sheep are loving it too. They are doing an excellent job of eating the new black berry shoots and keeping the new growth in check.
The weather this week warmed up, I could almost hear the grass growing. I love spring.
And lambs.
7 ewes delivered, 15 more to go
9 ewe lambs
6 ram lambs
15 lambs total
Our stats SO FAR:
Monique's lambing stats so far:
John & my stats are different - different breed sheep and ram.
Total between us, 23 sheep & 15 lambs = 38 head so far.
Sadie the Bald with her twins. One ewe lamb & one ram lamb. These are quite flattering pictures of her, you cannot see the massive bald spot on the back of her neck & head.
The little ewe lamb looks like Mom, with dark legs. Her face is speckled. The little ram lamb has some speckling but will have his coopworth father's coloring more so than mom.
Most of the clun/romney ewes have had light colored lambs, with some brown speckling. The clun's father was a black romney, the mothers were all purebred cluns. I really like these sheep. They work nicely, on top of having great shape & muscling. Good mothers too.
Here is the clun and her lambs that Monique saved the day by pulling. The first lamb was MASSIVE. Her lambs are light colored like their father an AI Coopworth ram.
The clun with the triplets is finally starting to call to her lambs. I let her out of the jug today with Fred. She is a wee bit worried about Fred in the lamb pen. She calls to him while I feed him, sniffing him, and talking to him. When I am done feeding him he stuffs his head under her tummy and tries to suck on her leg. He is none to smart. But Mom wants him and I am going to keep him with her and just supplement him until he gets his head screwed on straight, if ever. He will be moved to the bucket shortly.
He is finally sleeping with his siblings.
Today Grace helped me feed him.
I do not pick him up when I feed him, but Grace needed a lamb snuggle this morning. Who could resist?
One of the ewes escaped the lamb pen with her lamb this morning. Grace really impressed me in helping to get them back in. She was turning away when necessary, putting pressure where she needed all on her own. A shepherd in the making.
Yesterday I let Jim into the lamb pen for the first time. He is in love. He watches the lambs like they are creatures put on the earth only for his amusement.
The lambs are exploring and being....lambs. This ewe lamb loves to climb to the top of the wood pile and leap off.
Maimie's triplets are all growing equally well. She is an excellent mom, constantly counting her lambs. This one lay down in the straw, fell asleep. When she saw how close I got with my iPhone, she was quite angry. After I backed away she went up to the lamb, nudged him with her nose and chewed him out.
I had a tagging disaster with the ewe lamb the other day. I thought I had killed her. There was blood EVERYWHERE. Apparently I hit the major vein in the ear. I had to take the tag out and tried to stop the bleeding. I thought I had it stopped but when Monique stopped by in the evening she had dislodged the scab and it looked like a lamb was slaughtered in the jug. Monique put a pressure dressing on it and got the bleeding stopped. You can still see blood on her ear in the photo below.
We are going to start banding tails here soon. God help me if I do that wrong. I would much prefer to remove them quickly through the cut and cauterize technique. Although the machine required to do it is expensive, thus we have to use the rubber bands. It just makes me shudder to think about having an appendage dry up and rot off. Ouch. Testicles too. Double ouch.
Moving on...
Since we only have Sherman and 3 silly mindless lambs to work right now I have had to stick to driving. Putting them in the new pasture has livened things up a bit, creating new draws & pressures. Brynn has been loving it.
The sheep are loving it too. They are doing an excellent job of eating the new black berry shoots and keeping the new growth in check.
The weather this week warmed up, I could almost hear the grass growing. I love spring.
And lambs.
7 ewes delivered, 15 more to go
9 ewe lambs
6 ram lambs
15 lambs total
Our stats SO FAR:
- The first 6 weeks of lambing will all be from an AI Coopworth ram, Johnson.
- Last 3 weeks of lambing will be from AI Coopworth ram, Roy. (I sold to Roy Fido's Farm a couple months ago).
- Katahdin's were bred by Katahdin ram prior to arrival on farm
Monique's lambing stats so far:
- Monique's 3 Katahdins delivered 5 ewe lambs from Katahdin ram.
- Katahdins lambed 100% ewe lambs (1 still born)
- 3 Katahdin ewes/5 lambs = 166% increase
- Monique has two Border Leicester ewes left to lamb (Roy)
John & my stats are different - different breed sheep and ram.
- 3 Clun's - 4 ram lambs : 3 ewe lambs (Johnson)
- 1 Columbia ewe - 2 ram lambs : 1 ewe lamb (Johnson)
- 4 ewes/10 lambs = 250% increase (Johnson)
- John and I have 13 more ewes to lamb - total 17 ewes (and Sherman the wether)
Total between us, 23 sheep & 15 lambs = 38 head so far.
1 comment:
Loving the posts :0)
Love 'almost frozen' Fred and his blue checkerboard coat.
Keep up the good work and may the sun shine upon all of you!
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