Busy Weeks and Bouncing Lambs

Last week was a busy week, I ran home for the weekend to attend my cousin's bridal shower, and now I'm diving head-first into another week of elementary school field trips and trying to play catch-up from being gone all weekend.

All the lambs are loose in the pasture, running and jumping so fast they are like little woolly blurs.  Last week was so busy I forgot to tell you all that we had one more lamb!  Scarlett was the very last lamb born last year and she gave us our last lamb of this year.  Last Sunday, Joey woke me up and said excitedly, "Scarlett is having her lamb-come quick!"  We rushed outside in our boots and pjs to witness the birth since neither one of us had seen any of the other lambs being born.  Sure enough, a little white nose and a little hoof was sticking out.  Scarlett seemed so uncomfortable, laying down, getting up and walking around, and "baaa"ing like mad, almost screaming.  Our excitement quickly turned into uneasiness.  Joey was nervous because it seemed like she wasn't making any progress and we were worried about the lamb.  Since she was only born a year ago, she is still smaller than the other ewes and we were afraid that she was too small to push the baby out herself.

Worried for both mama and baby, we ran up to the house to get our plastic gloves and see if we could help.  We are able to get her to lay down and I stayed up by her head and made sure she didn't get up and Joey felt around the lamb's nose and tried to help pull the lamb.  He waited until she seemed like she was pushing (she was "baaa"ing pretty loudly when she pushed) and he eased the nose forward a little.  At this point, we were pretty sure the lamb was probably not going to be alive, but we were so worried about Scarlett, we wanted her pain to end.  After a few more pushes, Joey was able to get the head all the way out and the rest of the body quickly slid out on it's own.

The little lamb's body laid still in the dirt and then all of a sudden, it gave a little shudder and opened it's eyes and tried to breathe.  Shocked, Joey wiped the mucus from it's nose and mouth and something told me to rub it's sides.  Within a few seconds, it's head was up and looking around and we were able to see it was a boy.  And then Scarlett, first-time mama, came over and started to clean him up.  We sat and watched and he took his first wobbly step after 15 minutes of being in the world.  We were on top of the world that both lamb and mama were fine and that we were there to help.  It was such a thrill to think that when it came down to it, together we were able to throw on some gloves, and work together to being a new life into the world.  I'm so glad that we did it together, we were so proud, it was a rush of adrenaline and awe.

I called my mom later to tell her about it and how after he was born, I started to rub his little body to get some life into him just like the dad does to the little puppy in 101 Dalmations.  She said, "See, you do learn things from Disney movies afterall!"

Besides being our first assisted delivery, this little lamb is different from all our others because Dodge isn't his father, Patrick is.  Which means, he is half merino (from Scarlett) and half border leicester (from Patrick).  He has huge ears like his father.  It will be interesting to see what he starts to look like as he gets bigger.  And since Scarlett was born last year to Dorothy, that makes Dorothy both a mother and a grandmother this year.  She probably doesn't even know it.

So back to this crazy week...We've got lots of gardening projects going on around the homestead so hopefully I will get caught up soon so I can share!

Comments

  1. That's awesome! Does he have a name yet? Hopefully this week isn't too crazy for you!

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