Failure to Thrive- the Weak Lamb

It’s 4am. Dusty has been at work for 3 days. We are full send on the lambing front. Every year I go into lambing wondering/dreading what I will get to learn this year. Maybe one day I will hit a point where I feel like an expert or prepared to handle anything. That day has not yet come.... not even close. 

It’s was straight into the fire this year. No warm up. Just head first into a difficult pull. Everyone lived through the initial delivery... I’m not sure how even now that I have had 48 hours to process it and detailed notes in my health records. 

(I am going to digress for a moment.... I love records. It’s taken tweaking over the years and I’ll probably always be modifying and adjusting them but our health records have been one of my most valuable tools)

Anyways.....

Everyone lived through the initial delivery. 48 hours later though we are still dealing with consequences from that. Weak lambs are incredibly frustrating to me. We don’t get many but it’s usually a result from trauma at birth but we have had a lamb that was given perfect conditions and yet still failed to thrive. 

This little ewe lamb tonight was given 24 hours of colostrum. It took her 8+ hours to just stand. She had no sucking reflex. Somehow she survived the first 24 hrs and was walking and running and interested in the ewe. We started milking the ewe and feeding the lamb. We even got her to suck from the ewe. Then we took a sharp 180 and are headed in the opposite direction. The little ewe lamb is now in the house and being tube fed every 2 hours. The odds are she won’t make first light. She is having seizures and is star gazing. Hasn’t urinated but is still passing fecal matter. Temps are all normal. 

I have learnt so many things to try to assist a weak lamb to be successful and yet the one thing they need the most and the one thing I cannot help them with is A WILL TO LIVE. To want to thrive. 

Every time we have a loss on the farm it feels like a personal failure of my own and I think that is the most frustrating thing for me when it comes to the case of weak lambs and failure to thrive. 

2021

We started out right on schedule. 2020 was the first year we used a crayon on our rams and Hannah {the lovely Suffolk ewe below}was marked with her due date set for January 4th . January 4th in the early morning we had our first 2021 lamb. He’s a beauty! He is a vigorous curious lamb!

The longest Season

👆🏻👆🏻THIS has literally been my ENTIRE life  since December 26 2019.

I think my cameras are burnt into my memories. 

Part my fault and part the universe- this year has been THE longest lambing season of our sheep rearing careers! 

We are down to the last 2 ewes

 Ginny👈🏼 & 👉🏼Gwennie

{ I know that poor Gwennie is atrociously thin 😢😢 we have been very actively trying to build her health back up but we can’t keep up- this will most likely be her last set of lambs on our farm }

Anyways- I digressed ... 👆🏻👆🏻 Is literally what looks at me multiple times a day like, “oh hey! (Insert dopey smile and hair flip) how’s it goin??”

Next year we are working on getting everything delivered in 2 weeks! That’s my goal! 

I’m really not complaining 

{ok, I am}

But not really 

Because look at how sweet that little face is 👇🏻

❤️❤️❤️❤️

Perfection Pending

I seem to find this place to gather my thoughts or purge the difficulties this lifestyle carries. We have had a pretty good run this year. 30 ewes lambed and we lost one at a couple days old. We did all our commercial ewes and we had some difficult pulls but we seemed to come out the other side successful. 

Tonight, however, I am going to bed tired and a little defeated. I have absolutely unrealistic expectations of myself. When it comes to the husbandry part of this gig I absolutely expect zero errors from myself. A lesson learnt cost me a healthy (maybe) black babydoll ewe lamb. She was the second out of twins. Her mother is a good ewe. My gut told me all night that something was off but I try to be as hands off as I can and I talked myself out of intervening a few times. Not sure if it would of made a difference and that is always the kicker! 

I will stew on this loss for a while. I just can’t shake my expectation of perfection and the wave of failure that accompanies any loss. 

Lambing 2019

I would say overall it was a successful year here on the homestead. 

We ending lambing on a hard note this morning. 1 large dead ewe lamb. Died during birth. 

Large lamb

First time ewe

Both legs back

Wedged in canal

Plus we didn’t catch it right away

Death happens but for me it’s not easy but some deaths are easier to process than others. This kind of death sits on my shoulders. Ultimately, it’s my responsibility to get their lambs here safely and alive and when one dies in a pull that outcome squarely is mine.

I shoot for an unrealistic 100% success rate and some years I have been blessed to get that. This year was close. All but the last survived and with only a few ewes needing a little extra help. 

We are heavy on our ram lambs this year which makes this loss even more frustrating... a ewe lamb.

But as hard as this is, it’s another lesson learned.

Selling your Soul

Self- evaluation or farm evaluation can be a heart wrenching process (at least it is for me).

Do we have enough land to support this? 

Do we have access to enough feed?

Do we have the time to keep expanding?

Do we have the time to properly care for any animals?

Do we have enough money to support a hobby farm and our other needs?

Is this what we (all) want to be focused on?

Sometimes the answers all point full steam ahead. For our family, there have been some yellow lights, which has meant a closer inspection or a pause to reflect. 

As I write this I am driving 5 adult babydolls to their new home. The original 3 (Teddy, Bella, and Buttons) have all now found new homes. I feel so much sadness in my soul. Sad to say goodbye to the sheep that have been our base. I have had lots of moments of hesitation during the process of selling these 5. 

Do I honor the animal and let them live out their days on our farm?

Do I need to sell them?

Am I doing the right thing?

We sell lambs every year. We have sold older animals. This trip and process has been plagued with this question of right vs wrong. 5 older sheep is a significant change to our farm fabric. These particular sheep are also some of the animals we are most attached to.

I believe at some point every farm/farmer has to ask themselves these same questions. We know it's not a matter of right vs wrong but a question of aligning production & operations with your soul & passion. 

Today I/we are selling pieces of our soul to balance production. Another not so easy lesson.

2018 Breeding Schedule

2019 should be an exciting year for us. Most of 2018 we have contemplated changing our focus but after a tough year we decided to carry on through to 2019. We have a couple exciting changes. 2 new rams and some of our own rams joining the ranks. We also will have a new buck arriving just in time for our goats.