A Most Beautiful Lamb, and A Mystery

When I went out to check the sheep this morning, two ewes had lambed...my two oldest, who are each 11 years old and were born the first year of lambing at Pinwheel Farm. When I was milking my sheep, they were two of my top producers. Each has her own unique story of leaving the farm as a lamb, and then returning--back in the days before I understood "biosecurity" and the importance of keeping a closed flock.

There were three lambs born. One was stillborn--the "caul" or membrane still over its nose. Pure white and perfectly formed. There is another white lamb, with light tan "brockling" on its hind legs: a ram, large (nearly 15 lbs.) and robust but with extra teats. And a smaller (8.7 lbs) ewe lamb, with the most striking markings. She is coal black, with a broad white face and chin. Her front feet are white to the ankles. Her backlegs are white from just above the knees down to the ankles, black from the ankles down. And the lower half of her tail is white. What a beauty she is! She appears to be a culmination of years of selection and breeding--everyhting I've been working towards. Her relatively short, highly mobile tail demonstrates her East Friesien (dairy sheep) heritage. Her fleece is curly like a young Lincoln sheep, and promises to be long and silky like a Lincoln's. She is black (not grey), a highly desireable color and VERY rare in a Lincoln-type fleece. She has two relatively large teats (many of my best milkers have extra teats, which are annoying at milking time and can exacerbate hygiene and mastitis issues).

But--which lamb is whose? Eider (a "Judy-daughter" Finn/Romney/California Variegated Mutant cross) seems clearly to be the mother of the black ewe; she nickers over it with that special sound ewes only make to beloved newborn lambs, and nuzzles it tenderly towards her teats. Plus, Bertha has seemed to be very dominant white genetics, while Eider has had several black lambs. Bertha (99% Lincoln) smells the beautiful ewe lamb, then tucks her nose under and gently but decisively bunts her away. Bertha bawls for something she is missing, searches and searches. The ram lamb approaches Bertha and nuzzles at her udder, but only connects with Bertha's "extra" teat which is as large as many ewes' main teats. Bertha's huge, pendulous teats (which make her such a joy for hand milking) just don't even seem to register as "teats" in the minds of newborn lambs. (I shudder at thinking of the lengths I've gone to, to get lambs to use the right teats. A custom sheep-bra that left only the proper teats exposed. Superglue to prevent the extra teat from being accessible to the lambs....) Bertha encourages the little guy to nurse. Since he's not getting much out of the extra teat, he wanders over to Eider. She sniffs him, finds him acceptable, and allows him to nurse. So BOTH ewes think this is their lamb. I think it is Bertha's, and that she had a single, and the dead lamb is Eider's. But it's hard to tell. All three lambs have that Lincolnish fleece...a legacy of the sire's Lincoln heritage.

In most cases, I would separate them and make a decision myself about the mother. In this case, I'm letting them be. Both ewes are on my list to cull this summer, because of their advanced age. Commercial ewes are culled at 7; these gals have far exceeded that. Though both have always been on the pudgy side (Bertha's first name is "Big"), they have not kept weight well this past year, a sign of decline. If they want to mother the lamb together, I'll leave them in peace. I know he is getting plenty of colostrum from Eider, one of my best milking ewes. I'm milking colostrum from Bertha for storage (frozen) in case of emergencies with other lambs; the first milking yielded over 2 lbs. which is an incredible yield for a sheep. I will probably send Bertha to the processing plant with some other cull ewes & extra rams in early May, and leave the shared lamb with Eider. Till then, I'll milk Bertha out enough to keep her comfortable....

OK, I confess, milking out colostrum has whetted my appetite for sheep's milk and reminded me of how much I love the process of milking the ewes. So I'll milk Bertha out enough to supply myself with delicious sheep's milk (tastes like half-and-half with honey in it) for a few weeks...and I don't have to decide until May 8 which sheep are going to become my next batch of equally delicious summer sausage....

If my blog entries become more sporadic, it's not because nothing's happening here! Probably more to do with too much happening...like taking on a milk routine with no functional barn, and a full-time off-farm job....