Babies Busting Out All Over
April 26th, 2015 · No Comments · Posted in farming
After a couple of painful stillbirths earlier in the season, what a relief to see our animals successfully bringing new life onto the farm. Here you see Grace, herself just a yearling, just moments after giving birth on the pasture behind our house. This little girl is as black as her grandfather. She was up on all fours within minutes, looking to nurse. But as Winnie the Pooh put it so well, it was a cold and blustery day, not the kind of weather you want a wet, newborn lamb exposed to for long. We wrapped her in a blanket and took her and a reluctant mom back to the walk-in shelter in the paddock.
It’s still a mystery to me how you get such different results from the same group of sheep, even sheep with very similar bloodlines. Of the four Dorper ewes we purchased as lambs last year from a breeder in western New York, two had premature stillbirths and were both sickly afterwards. One of the would-be moms was so anemic she stopped eating and died. The other has been dragging her tail for days. I double-dosed her with worm medicine and started to force-feed her a high-protein mix out of a syringe. Finally, she seems to be perking up.
Compare those sad tales with this complete success story. From the same cohort, this young lady plowed like a tank through this year’s harsh winter. Nothing could get between her and the hay pile. She’s built like a tank and eats like a horse. The result: this bouncing baby girl who can’t nurse enough. In fact, these two surprised us. They had the first successful birth of the season completely unassisted. We were expecting that distinction to go to our Friesian breeding machine, Hannah, who is waddling around the farm with an udder the size of a basketball. We’re thinking she might be carrying twins. We certainly hope she gives birth before her udder bursts.
Meanwhile, Dolly, the grande dame of our small Kiko goat herd, quietly and ever so efficiently gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl. Baby goats are just as cute as lambs but a little scary. When they cry, they sound just like human babies and they cry the minute you pick them up. Dolloy is an old pro at this. She had these kids cleaned up and nursing in no time. But all of our mothers–and that includes our Jersey cow, Emily–are especially attentive. Watching them interact with their young, posing like statues for the youngsters to nurse, nudging them along when they need direction, talking to them with that unmistakable note of concern in their voices, never gets boring. It is a miracle of nature that unfold every day right there in front of us.
I am at times concerned about how these little newborns survive amongst the bigger, adult animals. We don’t have the infrastructure to provide them with a separate place to live while they grow. I’m always afraid they’ll get stepped on or crushed when it comes time for the herd to bed down at night. Yesterday I watched as Grace pushed her little lamb out of harm’s way when one of the older females got too aggressive.
Somehow our animals manage to get along and even thrive without too much intervention from us nervous humans.
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