#LAMBMETRICS for the day
Drysdale & English Leicester Flocks
Born today: 3
Total Lambs Born: 45
Drysdale lambs (live total): [no purebreds in 2019]
DrysdaleX lambs (total): 26
English Leicester lambs (live total): 19
Total Sets of Twins born: 9
Total Sets of Triplets born: 0
Total ewe lambs: 20
Total ram lambs: 25
Ewes lambed /68: 36 (52.9 %)
Lamb % : 125 % [live]
Assisted/Dystocias: 6
Losses: 0
Notable Midwifery tales:
Only three lambs born today but it’s been a little rough – as opposed to plain sailing.
In good news – one of the sets of twins that started on the bottle yesterday because their mum was “deficient” in the colostrum department seem to now be getting enough and her milk seem to be coming through. Yay!
And the other lambs taking the bottle are very sweet – as you’d expect.
The not-so-good aspect of the day involve a first-time mother that seems to have had a lamb which is perhaps a bit prem/dopey/NotQuiteRight and it won’t accept assistance from me and I’m not sure the mum is doing her thing properly. That may not end well. Nature sucks sometimes.
Then there was a lamb born this morning and seemed all okay but this evening has presented with possibly a damaged shoulder. ?! Argh. An attempt has been made to try and strap it but it’s all a bit shonky. Fingers crossed on that one.
But the worst thing was finding a week-old English Leicester lamb (male) who is sick. Seemed fine last night but it’s very sick and has a poor prognosis despite antibiotics. Nature sucks sometimes. 🙁 7-14 days old seems to be a fraught time – one reason I try watch them very carefully. Unfortunately, prey animals like sheep hide illness very well and lambs can be very fragile. (Sometimes they are as tough as nails too… it’s a weird thing.)
Hoping tomorrow brings some slightly better scenes!
