2011 lambs

All posts tagged 2011 lambs

The answer is 11!

Posted by kenleighacres on March 5, 2011
Posted in: Farm Life, Jacob Sheep, Lambing, sheep. Tagged: , , , . 14 Comments

Lambing season is all wrapped up!  The last 5 girls had 11 lambs and 7 of those lambs came within a 1-hour time frame! 

Jonquil was the first to lamb with a healthy set of twins…

her ram lamb, Lionel

and her ewe lamb, Amelia.

The next 3 girls decided to stir it up some!  This is the scene that greeted me after I picked my son up from school on Wednesday…

unfortunately, it wasn’t so organized 😉  There were 7 lambs being mothered by 3 ewes.  A little chaotic! 

I was able to sort them by size and markings and fleece and everyone seemed happy except for Veronica.  She really wanted Sahara’s ram lamb in addition to her 3.  I told her that she needed to be happy with what she had and not be greedy!

Here is Veronica with her triplets. 

Roland – ram lamb

Catherine – ewe lamb

Second ram lamb – Chaucer

  

Veronica is quite proud of herself and her brood, as she rightly shoud be!  I checked the girls at 2:00 before I left and she didn’t look close, I returned at 3:00 to triplets.  They aren’t exactly small triplets either – 8, 9, and 10 lbs.! 

This is Sahara’s ram lamb – Windsor

and her ewe lamb – Jasmine.

The other girl that lambed with them is Amber.  This is her ram lamb, Galahad. 

These are the first lambs by Blue Ewe’s Ringoes Albus ‘Ringo’. 

Here is Amber’s little ewe lamb – Arabella.  She is so petite and cute and pretty…

I just want to hug her and snuggle her and carry her everywhere. 

She is not a snuggly lamb though.  She wants to be with HER MOM!  A very oppinionated little thing 🙂

The last girl to lamb was Star.  She kept me waiting and waiting!  Finally she lambed yesterday afternoon.  She had twins!  It was apparent at birth that the ewe lamb had some issues.  The lower half of her face appearred to be deformed.  She had to be put down and once again lambing season has reminded me of how precious life is.  There will be an educational post coming.  The lamb had what is called ‘Monkey Faced Lamb Syndrome’ and it is caused by the ewe eating a poisonous plant early in gestation.  You can always count on lambing season to further your education!

 

Here is Star’s ram lamb.  I am so thankful she has a lamb to care for!  This is Ringoes other set of lambs.  The fleeces look very promising.

Thanks to all who participated in our little lambing contest!  6 of you guessed 11.  We have a winner……..

Tisha!  I know you are off having fun in California, but I will send you an e-mail and find out what you would like.

A t-shirt…really?

Posted by kenleighacres on January 24, 2011
Posted in: Jacob Sheep, Lambing, sheep. Tagged: , , . 10 Comments

Yep, I did afternoon chores in a t-shirt!  We are having a stretch of spring like weather…the birds are singing and all of the farm animals were soaking up the rays.

Wren took it to another level though…

she started rolling around and…

scratching her back just like a horse.  I’m not sure I have ever seen one of our sheep do this.  She was in heaven!

She was having so much fun, Bliss had to come see what she was doing and see if she needed to do it too 🙂

In the sunshine you can see this boy’s blue eyes and look at the little spot developing on his nose!  By the time he is a couple months old, all of the pink should be pigmented black.

Veronica was content to just stand in the sunshine and chew her cud.  She looked quite content!

I haven’t posted many pictures of the young boys this winter – they have mostly looked like drowned rats.  Not today…here is a picture of Durham and Ringo.  I LOVE their horns!  Ringo is such a nice boy – he has the temperament I wish all rams could have…calm, non-combative with his fellow rams, a good amount of respect for humans, and nice to his girls.

The ewes also thought it was a great day to have lambs…7 new lambs in total!

Ellyn and Lancelot – these beauties are Patchwork Abraham x Bide a wee Althea.  Althea had a ewe lamb and a ram lamb, both are lilacs and I think they are both 4-horn.

Walter – a 4-horn ram lamb – Kenleigh’s Wrangler x Kenleigh’s Celeste.  Celeste had twins, but the 2nd lamb didn’t make it.  A sad and unfortunately, unavoidable part of being a shepherd.  I know there was nothing I could have done to help this lamb, but it is still hard.  I am very happy that Celeste has a healthy lamb to dote on.

Dolly had twin ram lambs.  My son is thrilled!!!  Dolly is his ewe and he really wanted boys – I don’t know why, he just did 🙂  These lambs are Kenleigh’s Reno x Bide a wee Dolly.  This one is a 4-horn…

and this one is a 2-horn.  It was close to bedtime, so they don’t have names yet.

Abbey, a black & white ewe lamb and Avalon, a lilac ewe lamb – Kenleigh’s Reno x Kenleigh’s Aimee

At the same time Dolly was having her lambs, so did Aimee.  They were one big happy family when I found them!  The lambs thought it was great to have two moms.  Luckily, it was easy to sort out who belonged to who 🙂 

I love Avalon’s face markings!

Time to go to bed and prepare for the possibility of more lambs tomorrow!

Don’t be hasty

Posted by kenleighacres on January 19, 2011
Posted in: Jacob Sheep, Lambing, sheep, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , . 13 Comments

While I was out taking pictures of the sheep this morning, it hit me just how fast the lambs grow and how much they can change in a very short period of time.  I was also reminded to hold off judgement and not be hasty when deciding if the lambs will ‘make the cut’ or not.  There is a LOT involved in this breed… some of the qualities such as percentage of color, spotting pattern, and structure are somewhat obvious at birth, but fleece and horns are very hard to evaluate at a young age.  Fleece qualities can be seen at birth, but they can change – a consistent fleece can end up being quilted and a fuzzy fleece can surprise you sometimes.  Horns are definitely the hardest to get right – they can change in the blink of an eye, especially when there are 4 of them.  To make matters even more confusing, there are all of the traits you can’t see…mothering ability, hardiness, temperament, and the essence that makes a jacob a jacob.  Being hasty and making rash decisions can be detrimental to a breeding program. 

Two of our rams weren’t necessarily my favorite when they were born…

 Wrangler as a lamb

Reno as a lamb

There were qualities that I just didn’t like when they were born, but I held off judgement and watched them mature.  I can remember noticing them at about a month old and going ‘wow, look at you!’.  In both cases they continued to get better and better.  I will always be thankful to Joan that Wrangler stayed here instead of going to California 😉

  Here is Wrangler as an adult…

 

and Reno as an adult.

They both taught me a good lesson…so for now I am thoroughly enjoying the lambs 🙂 

 Queenie with her little Duchess.

She doesn’t need anybody telling her that she is cute – she is full of herself!

 Holly is still smiling and is very happy with her babies. 

 Emeline makes it very hard not to like her 🙂

A fine winter morning!

Posted by kenleighacres on January 10, 2011
Posted in: Ducks, Farm Life, Jacob Sheep, Lambing, sheep, whippet. Tagged: , , , . 7 Comments

I love this kind of winter morning…crisp, chilly, and beautiful!

The ducks managed to keep a little spot of their pond open overnight and they were enjoying the sunshine this morning.

The girls were all happy to see me…

but were quickly on their way.

I’m not sure what makes the thistles so delicious on these frosty mornings, but they are a favorite.

Would you like to know why Duchess is smiling this morning?

Holly finally had her lambs last night and now she has some friends!

She had a very large boy, weighing in at 10.5 lbs.  His name is Ector.   

Sir Ector was a knight of the Round Table and Arthurian legend says that he was King Arthur’s foster father.

The little girl is a bit more dainty, weighing in at 5.5 lbs. 

Her name is Emeline. 

The name Emeline is old German for ’embracing everything’.  It was a royal name in medieval England.

Paisley of course thinks it is a fine morning to stay inside and enjoy the warm fire.

A change of plans…

Posted by kenleighacres on January 7, 2011
Posted in: Farm Life, Jacob Sheep, Lambing. Tagged: , , , . 8 Comments

I have decided to change the naming theme for this year’s lambs.  There are several reasons for the change, but it all started with the lack of inspiration I was feeling with the previous theme.  A couple things happened today that pointed me in this new direction.  The most important being that Queenie had her lamb! 

She had a ewe lamb.  A ewe lamb that needed a name similar to her mother’s, Queenie, and grandmother’s, Princess.  I watched a King Arthur movie this afternoon and then I read Mud Ranch’s blog about Castles today – see the theme?  So, the naming theme for this year is going to be Medieval names… 

and this girl’s name is going to be Duchess.

Queenie looked like she was getting close this morning, so I decided to check on her and do the afternoon feeding before I headed into town to pick-up my son from school.  She looked closer, but not imminent.  I continued feeding and was headed out of the barn when I saw her laying down.  I did a double check and saw that her water bag was hanging out!  Wow, a lot closer to lambing then I thought!  ‘Good timing Queenie, I have to leave right NOW!!!’  I was concerned about leaving because she is a first time mom and I would be gone an hour.  I didn’t really have a choice, so I told her to check in with the older girls if she had any problems and rely on her instincts. 

She did a fantastic job.  The lamb was cleaned up and nursing when we got home.

I moved them to a small pen and gave mama some hay and dipped the lamb’s umbilical cord. 

The rest of the ewes were very interested in what was going on…

and poor Holly was really wishing it was her lamb!  Soon Holly, soon…