We had 10 lambs born in a 12-hour period last night and this morning! And we have only 8 ewes left to lamb. Last night began with Celeste, our wise 6-year-old Romney ewe. Lisa called the house around 9:00 and told Annie and me that Celeste was lambing, and wondered if we might come up to help her get Celeste’s coat off so the lambs could find the teats more easily. By the time we got up there, Celeste had two vigorous lambs, a girl and a boy. We helped Lisa get the lambs and Celeste into a jug, and came home. Around 11:00, Harriet went into labor and meanwhile Lisa realized that Celeste was having a third lamb in her jug! Lisa went to check on Celeste’s third lamb (another girl). Harriet, full of motherly emotions, seemed to think that she had just had a lamb and Lisa had whisked it away and was trying to give it to Celeste! Harriet stormed across the barn and tried to barge past Lisa to get at Celeste’s newborn triplet. Lisa shoved Harriet away, saying “Go back over there, you’ll have your own lambs soon!” Which she did, a nice pair of white “Romnesian” girls.
This morning, Melinda arrived at 5 am to find Maureen, the last of our three pregnant Romneys, in labor. Maureen had two boys, then shortly after Annie and I arrived at the barn at 7:30, Bunny started active labor. Bunny, an East Friesian, was huge, and had seemed imminent for days. She labored and labored but was not progressing, and when her water broke but there was no sign of a lamb, I investigated. I found two lambs in the birth canal. The first one I delivered had died, but we didn’t have time to dwell on that sadness, because Bunny delivered 3 more live and healthy lambs in rapid succession.
Today was the first day without rain in nearly a week, and the ewes and lambs enjoyed green grass and sunshine for much of the day.
