My No-Good, Very Bad Day

What a crummy day. 

Yesterday we moved our chicks and ducks out to the big coup, but this morning my in-laws called to say that they found 10 dead chickens in the coup-yard. Apparently, the chicks went out the coup door and couldn't get back in. With the rain and a bit of a drop in temperature, they couldn't keep their body temperature up.

Once I got that call, I realized how cool it had gotten, and went out to check on my sheep. Emerald was in the tall grass not moving. She'd been struggling with parasites and anemia, but had seemed stronger over the weekend. Dave (FIL) and I had to use the riding mower to get her into the barn. I warmed her up with towels, a heater, a heat lamp and a blow dryer, but she wasn't really responding. 

The vet came out and said that pneumonia had also set in, and so at her recommendation, I decided to put her down. I feel terrible. Hindsight is always 20/20, and I should have locked her in the barn last night. I just took it for granted that she was stronger than she really was.

Now we have two little orphan lambs, but they're 8 weeks old now capable of weaning. It's just sad to see them out there without their mom. And I'll really miss Emerald; she was a wonderful, sweet ewe, a great mother and had an excellent fleece. 

First Lambs of the Season!

That change in Emerald's belly sure was a sign of impending labor!

Emerald had twin ewes early this morning! What a great way to start the lambing season.

Kat had come into our room around 4:15 am, and since I was up, I decided to check the lamb cam. Everyone was peacefully laying down, but I decided to do another sweep around the barn. On the second pass, Emerald was standing and pawing the ground. Good sign of labor! When she layed down and did this:

I knew it was active labor. That photo doesn't look very dramatic, but she was raising her head up and back, and one point looking directly into the camera. Sheep don't generally look up that high. Her odd position and the fact that she was up and down were all indicators of what was going on.

So I made myself a cup of coffee, suited up in my winter working gear, grabbed two towels and the medical kit, and headed out. I made myself comfortable to watch, and within an hour she was pushing. 

When the first lamb was born, she was so tiny, I knew there had to be a second one. Well, I hoped there was a second one or else something was really wrong. 

I grabbed the towel just to clear her face, and Emerald was doing a good job licking her off. Within 3 minutes or so, the second lamb was born. I didn't really realize Emerald was pushing again so soon until I looked up, saw the lamb dangling and heard a "plop." The bag hadn't been broken around her face, so I went to her pretty fast to clear the fluid and get her breathing.

I have the birth of the first twin on video, and I had to put the camera down to clean babies up, so I don't have many photos until after both were born. 

Sparkles and Peridot (though in this photo it's Sparkles and June) went to the lambs pretty quickly and helped clean them off. I thought this was a beautiful, natural thing, and good since these were Emeralds first twin and she may have needed help. Also, they came so close together that she didn't have time to get #1 dry before #2 was born.

I didn't factor in their mothering instincts. Sparkles and Peridot are GREAT moms, so great that they wanted to mother these two. Sparkles started pushing Emerald away from the babies, so I scooped them both up and put them in the lambing jug.

Sparkles and Peridot followed so closely that Emerald couldn't get into the jug! I had to put the lambs down and bodily drag the other ewes out, then try to get Emerald in. It was a mess.

Then I was stuck. We don't have a gate on the jug yet, and the pallet that we were going to use to slide in front of the opening was outside! I gave Emerald  a few minutes then had to leave my post. When I got in, we had the same situation all over again. 

I pulled and dragged (I think I may have pulled out handfuls of wool!) and finally got everyone where they were suppose to be. And slid the pallet in place.

I watched for a while, but Emerald was too busy eating to really pay much attention to the lambs, and I was tired. So I went in, gave them each a good rub down, removed the waxy plug from both teats, and even milked a little syringe-full of colostrum. This is a trick I learned from another blog: feed the lambs an ounce or so of colostrum and it's enough of a boost to get them up and nursing faster. Not exactly the most natural way to do things, but it lets you go back to bed sooner!

Here they are finally separated into their own jug:

Two nice gray Katmulgets ewes, one with some fun spotting on her head. There's a slight chance that the one laying down is fawn, but I'll have to wait until all the goo is off and the sun is out to really tell.

At two hours old now, they're both popping around and nursing well!

My prediction is that Sparkles and Peridot will both lamb within the next 24 hours.