Adventures in bottle feeding

This is an update of our previous post. We had two sets of twin lambs born last week, but we ended up with one lamb being rejected by its mother.
There are lots of reasons that a ewe will reject its lamb, but we suspect this was due to the sharp teeth that the little ram had. We tried several times for the ewe to accept the lamb, but she bunted it around and wanted to have nothing to do with him.
About the only solution – after you use an emery board to file down the sharp teeth (which are obviously painful to the ewe’s udder) – is to restrain the ewe with a stanchion. That way she cannot use her head to knock the lamb around and she will eventually get used to the idea that the lamb is nursing from her again.
We have no such stanchion in our lamb barn (another project for Chris). We managed to hand-milk some colostrum from the ewe and we used a feeding tube to get it into the lamb’s stomach. Getting colostrum from the mother is vital for the survival of the lamb.
The first night the little guy spent in a straw-lined box in our bedroom so he could stay warm and so it was easier for us to start bottle-feeding and they need to be fed frequently right after birth. It was also important for his safety so he wouldn’t be knocked around by his mother or by the other ewe that gave birth, since he was trying to nurse off her too.
After the first night we took the lamb into a separate pen into the lamb barn and we fed him with lamb milk replacer about every four hours. He’s finally eating enough that we can feed him before we go to bed – about 11 p.m. – and then not until 5 a.m. or so.
Ideally we’d like to get to the point where he can suck from a specially-designed bottle that fits into a holder, but the scalawag (we call all our rams scalawag) is spoiled and wants to eat only from the baby bottle.
In another week we can introduce him to some solid food and hopefully he will be strong enough to join the rest of the flock. We let him run around on his side of the barn (which is secure) during the day but make sure he and the rest of the flock are locked inside during the night lest his baaing draw the attention of the coyotes that prowl our woods. He’s very vocal about when he thinks it’s time to eat!
It’s been a long week as both of us have had little sleep, but it will get better. And while we have late-night bottle feedings, at least we don’t have to change diapers!

2011 lambing season has begun

Today (Feb. 13) marks the first lambs of the 2011 season.
Our Suffolk ewes – Kitty and Fanny – each had a set of twins. Kitty had ram lambs and Fanny had a male and a female. They were born about 10 a.m.
Sherry had been checking the ewes about every four hours for the past few days. She knew when the lambs were due because they were bred one day last fall when our Scottish Blackface ram Mr. Darcy broke through the fence and ravaged them. It was not the coupling that we sought since these are two of our best ewes. We wanted our purebred Suffolk ram Colonel Fitzwilliam to breed them.
We were fortunate that the weather took a turn in the past two days. Thursday morning we had 25-below-zero, which is not an ideal condition for lambing. Today the temperature is in the low 50s, so perhaps fortune has smiled upon us.
Both mothers and their lambs are in temporary pens, where the lambs can get a chance to nurse and the mother can eat free of interference from the other ewes. Since these are experienced mothers, we will probably keep in them in the pen only a couple of days, as long as the lambs appear to be eating and getting stronger.
It will be two more weeks before we expect the rest of the ewes to start giving birth. The first two weeks of March will be crazy. Last fall we expanded our sheep barn and Chris built about a dozen lamb pens, so we should have plenty of space.
Until then we can sleep through the night without having to make 2 a.m. visits to the barn.