Maternity Mayhem

It is April 17th. There are 19 babies in the pastures, and we have not finished birthing yet. The Angora goats started the maternity ward, and there were no problems. The only problem we had was that the goats we wanted to have babies did not. The five little kids we have are rambunctious and riotous in the pastures. They run, jump, dash, charge, race, and dart all day long. It is wonderful to witness.

March has passed, and now the sheep begin birthing in April. The first mother gave birth to twins, and she rejected the male and accepted the female. Why? We still do not know, and he is the first bottle baby. We milked her engorged teats and treated the lambs to the first colostrum, but she continued to reject him. I tried taking the poop from the female lamb and putting it on the male so she would accept him, but it did not work. Another ewe had twins, and the one twin died right after birth, so we tried rubbing the carcass of the dead lamb on the rejected male, and again, that did not work.

One morning, on my way to the barn, I saw the signs the ewe gives that she is about to deliver. There is the isolation, the pawing of the round, and the walking in circles. This black ewe delivered triplets, two males and one female, but the one male could not lift his head. In fact, he would walk in circles, crying, trying to find his mother. She remained aware of him, but we had to pump her to feed him. After a frantic call to the vet, she suggested a shot of BOSE and a shot of vitamin B. Several days later, he is now able to walk and stay with his family, but we are still feeding him.

Other lambs arrived, and most had no troubles. If the ewe had engorged teats, we would pump them so the lambs could attach to them without issue. Later in the month, a ewe had been in labor for 45 minutes, and we decided we needed to help. Fred reached in, grabbed a huge lamb, pulled, and he announced it was backward. It was dead. A second reach inside her; Fred found another lamb that had arrived alive. After one more reach inside, he found a third lamb, also dead. These lambs were almost 20 pounds apiece.

All in all, it was a rewarding and exhausting birthing season for us. There are only a few animals left to deliver, and hopefully, all will go well. These two shepherds are ready for a long nap.