As we moved into our last week of lambing the weather decided to cheer up and we enjoyed a glorious few days of sunshine. Us farmers are never happy though and we are in desperate need of some rain now, not a monsoon, but just a few days or nights of heavy drizzle would be ideal to keep the grass growing as the ewes & lambs, together with the cooler temperatures, have been managing to bare the fields pretty quickly!
Our last lamb was born on 21st April, a single ewe lamb to a gimmer (first time mum). Both have now joined the rest of the flock outside which means the shed is empty and VERY quiet! It’s always a little bit sad when you stand in the empty shed after the last few weeks of hustle and bustle but at the same time it is pleasing (and relieving) to know that lambing has passed and, all in all, it has gone very well.
The work doesn’t stop here though. In a few weeks we will gather the entire flock to give the lambs their first vaccination against certain bacterial diseases that they are now susceptible to. The lambs are relatively immune to all these things in the first few weeks of life as long as they have had sufficient colostrum (first milk) from their mother. Because the mother receives the same vaccine during pregnancy, she passes the antibodies to the lambs through the colostrum, but this only lasts a few weeks, hence we must vaccinate the lambs themselves to ensure they stay healthy for the coming months.
Some of the ewes will also receive medicine at this time to help control any parasites in/on their bodies. Parasites are a normal occurrence in livestock and are fine in small numbers but if they increase to an unhealthy number, then it can cause the sheep to lose weight, scour (runny poo) and sometimes even die so it’s an important part of the routine.
Farming is a round the clock job, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Looking after animals is a big responsibility. It is hard work but it is also extremely rewarding! I have to give massive credit to our children, Rory, Euan & Blair, who are a huge help to us, especially at this busy time of year. Euan and Blair, like many farming children, spent the full two weeks of the Easter holidays with me in the lambing shed whilst Rory helped his dad with the cattle every day as well as working out in the fields, preparing and planting some of our crops. It was a busy couple of weeks for them with early mornings and late nights and I think they were glad to go back to school for a rest!! On the farm, we are now getting ready to put our cattle out to grass for the summer & muck out all the sheds. It will then be time for a lot of maintenance jobs before the lambs’ second vaccinations then silage time which will lead on to shearing time for the sheep. They will then get to enjoy the summer before the cycle starts again in August and before we know it, we’ll be lambing again in 2022!!