12th Jan
Before we went off to sleep last night, we had observed Barbara on the ‘Barbara-cam’, pawing the ground and behaving in an unsettled manner. I assured James that this was a sign that within hours she would go into labour (all the books say so!!).I was awakened this morning at 7 o’clock by James suddenly shouted ‘argh!’ as he came around from a dream about sheep giving birth. I was instantly wide awake and so I turned up the sound on the Barbara-cam. Barbara was making a very gentle bleating ‘murmur’ and my instinct told me that she was either giving birth or just about to. I rushed to pull on my clothes and told James that I was going to check it out. I arrived at her pen just in time to see her giving birth to a lamb and called James to come as quickly as he could. It soon became obvious that there was not one, but two lambs on the floor behind her. One had obviously been expelled earlier, but it was apparently untouched. Barbara began licking the twitching lamb which she had just given birth to, whilst James ran to rouse our neighbor (who had previously been a sheep farmer) and I began to try and revive the firstborn, unresponsive lamb. I cleaned its face of mucus, rubbed it with a towel and swung it by its back legs (as per the instruction manual), but the lamb seemed quite dead. I don’t know how long it had lain on the floor before we found it. Our neighbor arrived and we turned our attention to the second born lamb which appeared to be in a bad way. She was cold and unresponsive although she was breathing. We were just starting to see an improvement when something else fell away from Barbara. We went to look, expecting to see the afterbirth, but instead found that she had given birth to a third lamb! The morning was chilly, and James went to fetch a fan heater to warm and dry the two living lambs which were both small and feeble. After two hours of attention they were still weak and floppy and just seemed to want to go to sleep. Barbara kept pawing at them to try and make them get up, but they didn’t seem to have the energy. We persisted with the fan heater and about midday – success – both lambs stood up almost simultaneously and took their first wobbly steps.
Since then they have gone from strength to strength. They have to be helped to feed as they don’t seem to be able to find the teats on their own, but they are bright and alert and almost running around the pen already. Isn’t nature amazing? Imagine if we could walk and display such independence within hours of being born!
We haven’t chosen names yet, but tonight, over a bottle of wine with friends we discussed the possibilities. The favourites so far are brother and sister acts, ‘Donny and Marie’ or ‘Michael and Janet’. If anyone has any other suggestions I would love to hear them.
Before we went off to sleep last night, we had observed Barbara on the ‘Barbara-cam’, pawing the ground and behaving in an unsettled manner. I assured James that this was a sign that within hours she would go into labour (all the books say so!!).I was awakened this morning at 7 o’clock by James suddenly shouted ‘argh!’ as he came around from a dream about sheep giving birth. I was instantly wide awake and so I turned up the sound on the Barbara-cam. Barbara was making a very gentle bleating ‘murmur’ and my instinct told me that she was either giving birth or just about to. I rushed to pull on my clothes and told James that I was going to check it out. I arrived at her pen just in time to see her giving birth to a lamb and called James to come as quickly as he could. It soon became obvious that there was not one, but two lambs on the floor behind her. One had obviously been expelled earlier, but it was apparently untouched. Barbara began licking the twitching lamb which she had just given birth to, whilst James ran to rouse our neighbor (who had previously been a sheep farmer) and I began to try and revive the firstborn, unresponsive lamb. I cleaned its face of mucus, rubbed it with a towel and swung it by its back legs (as per the instruction manual), but the lamb seemed quite dead. I don’t know how long it had lain on the floor before we found it. Our neighbor arrived and we turned our attention to the second born lamb which appeared to be in a bad way. She was cold and unresponsive although she was breathing. We were just starting to see an improvement when something else fell away from Barbara. We went to look, expecting to see the afterbirth, but instead found that she had given birth to a third lamb! The morning was chilly, and James went to fetch a fan heater to warm and dry the two living lambs which were both small and feeble. After two hours of attention they were still weak and floppy and just seemed to want to go to sleep. Barbara kept pawing at them to try and make them get up, but they didn’t seem to have the energy. We persisted with the fan heater and about midday – success – both lambs stood up almost simultaneously and took their first wobbly steps.
Since then they have gone from strength to strength. They have to be helped to feed as they don’t seem to be able to find the teats on their own, but they are bright and alert and almost running around the pen already. Isn’t nature amazing? Imagine if we could walk and display such independence within hours of being born!
We haven’t chosen names yet, but tonight, over a bottle of wine with friends we discussed the possibilities. The favourites so far are brother and sister acts, ‘Donny and Marie’ or ‘Michael and Janet’. If anyone has any other suggestions I would love to hear them.
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