This was the smallest lambing group for me in long time. Half the number as usual. Since the flock is comprised of older ewes and yearlings there are plenty of singles and enough twins and not a single set of trips or quads. It was the near perfect pace for lambing when doing so on one’s own.
I had two great saves this lambing season, the kind of saves that leave you feeling like you still have it in you, and there is someone on your side. Both were ewes having birthing trouble. Both ewes were caught on open pasture with a leg crook. This is the closest to what I think it might be like to rope a calf by the rear leg. The exultation I feel with making one of these catches is likely equivalent to a sports professional making a score in a playoff series. And yes, there is a wide grin and a happy dance, notwithstanding the trouble in the first place.
In the first case the lamb was very large and even though the pull was pretty simple the lamb was lost, head too swollen and birth time too long to save it. The second ewe was an experienced ewe with a lamb coming hind feet first and locked up. The lamb was successfully pulled but not breathing. A few head shakes and tickles with grass up the nose and she took her first gurgling breath. At last check mamma and babe are doing fine.
On account of the heat wave rolling across the prairie the morning rounds are early and the evening checks are late. The ewes graze very early in the day, disappear into shade during the heat and rise again late in the evening for a second graze. The guardian dogs are lying low and only sort of interested in eating. The magpies however, are ever vigilant. And the lambs,… in the cool of the evening the lambs are beginning to run and dance and crash and burn as only lambs can.
The start of this post was about how long the week was but that’s not really accurate. The week wasn’t long, the week was full, very full, and it flew by. This week was the kind of week that makes you lose track of ten days.
Mother Nature brought some moisture in the form of gorgeous wet snow. Enough to blanket the earth for a day and keep the dust at bay. The temperatures remained cold so the snow stuck around and the melt was slow and rewarding. If my mind were not fixed on the worries of new lambs on pasture I am sure I would have heard the prairie welcoming the moisture.
Cold wet weather is the pitfall of pasture lambing but it also seldom occurs in May. The odds are in our favour and when bad weather does come we brace ourselves. And right now I cannot count this snowfall as bad weather. The snow was gratefully received.
The cold, wet weather did make for a challenging day of decision making (aka guessing) about what should/could be done. We put bedding out for the ewes which caused some amount of chaos as everyone crowded to one place and ewes and lambs became separated in the mayhem. They do eventually find each other but it wreaks havoc on one’s sense of doing the right thing.
There was no going around and disturbing lambs to ring tails or nuts because the weather was already the number one stress for lambs. There was no need to add another stress at this point in time. There were several newborn lambs further afield looking very pitiful lying in the snow at moms feet. Some ewes had moved into a slough bottom so the little gaffers were actually tucked out of the wind but the earth at their feet was still cold and wet and snow was still falling like rain. I set about moving sets up to the bedding and placed lamb coats on the few I thought might need it. There were others still further afield but those I left alone. I am not sure how to describe what the difference was, why I moved some and not others. I felt those that I left had a good chance of making it with momma right where they were. They were up, they were moving and they would suck when they had a moment. Movement, milk and a good momma seemed like three good signs to get through the day with.
I could write a manual on pasture lambing and fill it with useful tips. Yet in these situations there is seldom a concrete if-this-happens-then-do-that answer. There is seldom a situation of offering the same help for all and there is no state we reach and then forever know what to do. We work, we play, all in concert with Mother Nature. We observe, we listen to the notes and maybe we add our own back, maybe we don’t. Maybe we just go back to listening and observing. And all throughout the play we celebrate our wins and cry our losses.
So the week was full of lambs and sheep and success, and then it was full of snow and cold and a few losses, and then it was back to lambs and sheep and successes. The week was simply and completely full of lambing.
It’s late afternoon, the ewes just moved into the next grazing pasture so there is the eager activity and constant movement of grazing animals on new ground. Despite the grass being dry, dismal and dusty everywhere we go the ewes remain eager about arriving onto fresh ground. Unlike myself who struggles to see what there is to be eager about in the midst of a drought – they are a reminder to live in hope. An earlier drive to check fence lines revealed dry sloughs and wetlands. There is no surface water on this pasture. Every drop of drinking water will have to brought here by me.
I travel the area in the side by side moving in a mentally mapped out grid pattern; this corner, that hill, into the next flat, up to the next rise. I’m watching for birthing ewes and looking for unmarked lambs of appropriate age to catch for ringing tails and nuts.
Two ewes are bawling for the lambs they lost in the move. Tired lambs are resting here and there, heedless of any calls, and numerous ewe and lamb sets travel together. The ewes bawl and in the distance a lamb wails back. No matter how much I harden my heart a bawling ewe calling for her lambs or worse a lamb crying for the ewe, always dents it. The downside of hilly landscape is the shortness of the visual sight line. You cannot see for miles out here unless you are on the right hilltop. A ewe and a lamb might be one hill over from each other and not see.
I continue to drive my grid pattern, catching the lambs I find, tagging and ringing, returning them to momma. The sound of the bawling ewe follows me around the pasture. Blackbirds sing, a hawk watches from a perch on a distant fence post. Then a meadowlark trills its wonderful song. There is a notable lack of insect noises. Too dry perhaps.
After my go around on the pasture I head back to the previous pasture and prepare to move the water bus. Dumping the trough and loading it into the back I leave the side by side, climb into the water bus and drive around, moving slowly, because the pastures are rough and the water tanks in the back are full.
Just where is the best spot for the one and only water station on pasture? Anywhere, everywhere? I park the bus and as I unload the trough and hook the hose to the float device ewes are trotting over, already in need of a drink. The call goes out, water is here. More lambs and ewes become separated in the parade of animals coming up to the water bus and crowding there. No morning dew and lack of surface water means this is a new normal this year. More bawling of lambs for ewes and ewes for lambs.
I begin my walk back to the vehicle I had to leave when I picked up the bus. Over my shoulder, one of the bawling ewes is just cresting a hilltop. She stands still and bleats. She is a wonderful silhouette against the low sun. I walk on through a hollow, skirting the center of tall, dry grass. I pass a sleeping lamb who startles awake and lets out a lamb sized screech. The right screech apparently. The ewe from the hilltop gurgles and runs over. She was returning to the last place she saw her lamb. Success, one pair reunited. My hope for the other lost pair finding each other rises a notch.
Ten days into lambing and every ewe has lambed unassisted, smooth as can be. Three deaths so far and none were today. There is no outwardly obvious hardship of loss and yet this evening, with this move, has been full of the sights and sounds of how chaotic lambing on grass can be. Pasture lambing is a lesson in trust of something outside our control. In order for it to work without overworking ourselves, in order for there to be a balance between mother nature and us, there has to be a reliance on the workings of mother nature, otherwise, what are you doing it for. You might as well call the banker, move into a barn, take nature out of the equation and control every step.
I arrive back at the side by side. Chaos or no, I’ll choose a way to balance with mother nature every time.
