Percy, Polly and Pandora

We have three pet lambs - Percy (pictured right having fun) came first, his Mum simply did not want him and he started to hide behind the water bucket, so as he had two stronger siblings, we had no choice but to take him off his Mum as he was not getting much milk. Percy is now a champion milk bottle sucker!
He was very distraught when we introduced Polly, trying to kick her out of his nice straw bed and even weeing on her head once. He has now become quite fond of her. Polly was also a triplet, but they were all quite big and so one was always going to be short of milk. Polly was last to be born, and was a bit slow so she joined Percy in the pet pen. She loves sitting on your knee and being cuddled and stroked.
Then along came Pandora. Born at night in the big shed, Pandora strayed slightly too far from her Mum (we are only talking about 15m here but its enough for a sheep if they are that way inclined) and on being reunited Pandora was ecstatic but Mum said 'No Way'. We tried for a week to get them to bond, Pandora was game enough to stick in and suckle but her mum just seemed to hate her so we finally gave up and Percy has his harem! I should add here that Pandora's mum is a shetland ewe so she has the cutest face ever.

Sniffy Knees and all that

Only one left now, as I think the last one is not in lamb. We have a couple of problem sheep left in the sheds. The first one is nicknamed 'sniffy knees' as she took very badly with lambing (a first timer) and really did not want to be suckled. She would let them suckle if we stood over her, but constantly seemed to draw comfort from sniffing her knees. The lambs were strong and worked as a pair and soon bossed her, but when we had a trial run in a bigger shed, they couldn't get her pinned down to suckle, so back in the small shed she went. We'll let her out in a couple of weeks when they are needing less milk so it won't matter so much if she runs off! She does however seem to be getting fonder of them so who knows?
Also back in is Pixie, as one of her twins is lame. He has been treated by the vet but it's just a case of time for whatever he has hurt to heal. Daisy is also a first timer and the lambs have been overpowering for her and have ravaged her teats - their teeth are very sharp! Hopefully the antibiotics she has had will prevent mastitis occurring, and the teats are being covered in udder cream three times a day and are healing slowly. The lambs are penned to one side of her and only allowed to suckle for very short spells under supervision. They are very stubborn, though, and will not take extra bottle milk so may end up being weaned at 5 weeks old, next week. This would allow Daisy to recover fully and hopefully be okay for next year.

Little and large!

On Sunday evening we had the unexpected (a week early) arrival of the smallest lamb we have had this year. We had vaccinated for bluetongue on Friday and although we kept things very quiet and low key it is likely that this young sheep, a first time lamber, was upset by it and so lambed early. She had licked the lamb clean when Rachel found them, and with a bit of help and the removal of a large amount of wool to clear a pathway into her udder, the lamb seems to be getting enough colostrum to still be surviving four days on.
The next day I was home alone, without the 'lambulance' - the new name for our daihatsu truck! - as it was away for its MOT, and another first timer was lambing. This was the complete opposite, a very big lamb and with one leg still right back. Thank goodness for Countryfile, where two weeks ago he demonstrated tipping a ewe up on her head to get help from gravity in order to push the lamb back in to be able to find and straighten the missing leg. A lamb this big could not be born without doing this as there would simply not be enough room to get it out. Anyway, alls well that ends well and the lamb was fine. Mum was a bit shocked though, and it took her until the next day before she really came round to thinking she maybe did like her baby after all.

more lambing news!

Its been a hectic fortnight since I last wrote. More than half of the sheep have lambed and many are now back out at grass. Its lovely to see the groups of lambs playing in the evenings, but very noisy at feeding time for the ewes when a lot of the lambs temporarily lose 'Mum'. All the expected sets of triplets have arrived plus a couple of extra sets. Some ewes cope but others cant handle it or one of the lambs isn't feisty enough to stick in and get its fair share of milk, so inevitably we have ended up with a couple of pet lambs so far. I'll post some pics in the next couple of days.