Lamb update, age 2-3 weeks

When market lambs are quite young, they are started out on "creep" feed. This is a high nutrient starter food that helps the bacteria in their rumen get started out in a healthy way. You can see the little lamb door in the front panel. The first time we left the yummy, enticing creep feed in there, Kivu, our Shetland ewe, managed to make her way in and clean up the feed, however she then got stuck inside. She hasn't attempted this since! Technically our Shetland ram lamb shouldn't be eating creep, however he's first in and last out daily (Shetlands as a breed do not require extra feed like this; they do well on straight grass/hay). Once again we are grateful to Linda Swaine (Rosehaven Farm Store), whose panels and electric fence we were able to "store" in a way that housed sheep!


This is Basil, our freezer lamb. Right now he's very sweet, but as his hormones surge around 4 months he will likely end up quite aggressive. So hard to imagine, but it does make it easier to take the ram lambs to the abbatoir.



Here is Tarragon ... still a lab puppy. And getting much too fat, between the uneccessary creep feed and being the sole recipient of mom's milk.


Here is a close-up of Tarragon's emerging horns. They started out as flat leathery patches when he was born, and started to poke out very slightly when he was about 2 weeks old. He is 3 weeks old here.


Here is Peppercorn. She is doing really well, and has started gaining trust in us two-legged types. She is smallish but very gentle and will be a great first-year 4H lamb.



Here is Rosemary, one of Latifah's girls. She is also on the smallish side. Neither of Latifah's babies are very approachable yet. It may be because we had to treat Latifah for retained placenta, including seven days of penicillin shots. She became very wary of our visits, and managed to pass that on to her lambs. IF you can catch Rosie, she is very sweet, and will probably be our other first-year 4H lamb. She is a little close-coupled and more Shetland-like than I prefer, and won't be a keeper (at this point).


And lastly, here is Coriander. Conformationally, she is far and away my favourite, and is currently my first choice to stay on here and replace her mom as a breeding ewe. She has a good long back and good legs. She also runs and jumps like a steeplechaser, twice as high as the other lambs, and has the unfortunate tendency to be very, very, (VERY!) loud. These last two attributes are not a good thing :-). I can just picture the noise she is going to make in the show ring! So we'll see. She and her sister have pink skin around their eyes, which I find less attractive than the black skin that Jasmine's babies have.


There will be tough decisions to make this year. We can only keep one ewe lamb, who will replace Latifah as a breeding ewe. I will only over-winter three sheep here due to feed cost and space considerations, so that means finding good homes for two ewe lambs, culling Latifah, shipping Basil, and ... well, not sure yet about Tarragon. I'll have to have Bill Stearman (Willow Garden Shetlands website ; Willow Garden blog) come over and assess his fleece before I make any decisions.

I dearly wish I could keep all three ewe lambs. They all carry colour genetics now, since Spencer was black; with this next generation we can expect coloured lambs, which is one of my flock goals. My farmer buddy Arnold is making noises about selling his farm again (some of you may remember the last time we tried to purchase his farm ... what a fiasco once the realtors stepped in). It would be perfect for sheep. Arnold has really aged over the winter, and I wonder whether this time he will manage to actually go through with the sale ...

Heh, heh ... would anyone like to invest in a lovely Dutch farmstead/sheep farm in beautiful Prince Edward County, Ontario?