A luxurious new sheep shelter

Our Shetland sheep have had a rest from breeding this year. We missed lambing, but it made for a much less stressful Easter period.

We thought we would lose Rambo, our ram, as he lost a lot of weight over winter. We've changed his wormer and our shearer gave him a vitamin and mineral drench. This seems to have halted the weight loss, though he's not really putting it back on either.

Shetland sheep are remarkably hardy. Rain, wind and snow are nothing to them. In fact they look their most uncomfortable during the summer when the sun beats down. There's not really any shade for them as we can't put them in under the trees - the trees wouldn't last very long at all.

This small paddock near the house provides perfect shade
but only enough grass for about three days.
The sheep appreciate being sheared in late May so they don't overheat.

I've been turning ideas for shelters around in my head. Last year I got hold of some large corrugated roofing sheets. They're second hand but they don't need to be perfect. I don't want to spend a fortune as the sheep pasture is divided into six small paddocks and I'd like some shelter in at least half of them. It will need to stand up to strong winds, sheep scratching and maybe the occasional bout of being rammed by the rams.

I came up with a good design when we constructed the new fenced paddock last year and I did start on adapting this for a more open situation but the ground was rock hard and the job became consigned to the ever expanding to do list.

The corrugated metal sheets became temporary ground cover around the cabin. Until yesterday that is, when a marathon clearing session with the scythe reminded me they were there. On the spur of the moment I decided it was time to sort out a design for the sheep shelters. 

I usually start with an idea in my head and adapt the design as I go along to fit the materials available.

After a couple of hours, using just four wooden posts, four wooden pallets, a couple of lengths of wood and two corrugated sheets, the shelter was complete. When they've munched their current paddock I'll move the sheep in to test the design.

If all goes well I'll start on more shelters. They will be easier with the design now worked out.

A new sheep shelter.
Easy to build, £12 for posts, £6 for corrugated roof, £4 for wood, pallets free + nails and screws.
The key to the design is the wood both below and above the corrugated sheets so the wind can't take them (hopefully!) The one I built last year easily survived 60mph wins.

It was a beautiful day for working outside. There's  not much better than working in the fresh air under our uninterrupted fenland skies.

You'll know how into nature I am. I am happy to just admire, but I've resolved to try to learn a few more identifications. So if I see something which is new to me or which I can't put a name to, I am taking the time to look it up and learn a little more about the fauna an flora around me.

Today's find was a cluster of these delightfully cute beetles on one of the pallets I was using to construct the sheep shelter. A few scuttle off before i could get a picture.
They are in fact 16 spot ladybirds. They are just a few mm long. The feed on pollen, fungi and nectar.

Easter Sunday Lockdown Blog Resurrection

Well how things have moved on since I returned from Thailand and had to go into self isolation for a few days as I brought a cough back with me. I've actually been in isolation again since then, but whether or not I've had the actual virus is unknown.

Coronavirus has turned the world upside down, but as smallholders we are in a pretty fortunate position compared to many others. We have plenty of outdoor space in which to spend our time and keep busy. In many respects things haven't changed too much for us, except we have a little more time to do what we enjoy doing. We are fairly self sufficient too, although this is traditionally the hungry gap.

One of our chooks struts past 

an early asparagus stem

Unlike much of the country, we have eggs coming out of our ears - hen eggs, duck eggs, turkey eggs, goose eggs. Rhubarb has been on tap for a while now and the first asparagus tips have rocketed from their winter hibernation (necessitating a quick emergency weeding session!)
We still have some vegetables which have stood over winter - plenty of parsnips and leeks though they are past their best.
We haven't yet learned how to grow loo roll!

There have been other benefits - a much quieter road and the cheapest heating oil we've ever seen. In fact coronavirus has given the earth a chance to breath and just maybe lockdown will give people a chance to reflect on their lives and habits. I will write another post about this soon.

The dogs on lockdown

But for now there is no excuse for not getting this blog back up and running again. In many ways the digital world has come to our rescue, so the resurrection of my blog can be my little contribution to that!

I won't try to cover everything we've been up to here since I've been back from Thailand, but lockdown has given us a good chance to keep on top of things without having to work 25/8.
For now, here's a few photos from the last couple of days

These two hives down in the orchard are very strong and active.

Sue has been busy with her bees. We are down to six very strong colonies and they are already making honey. Three colonies did not make it through the winter as numbers had dwindled too far or lost their laying queen. Six hives is more manageable for Sue, though swarm season will be upon us soon. Sue has already found a queen cell in one of the hives.

We have put all the hives up on hive stands which makes for working at a better height and easier lifting as beekeeping can be heavy work.

The fruit trees are coming into blossom now and with fine weather we should hopefully get a good fruit crop this year.

The paddocks have now dried out and the grass has started its spring growth. We are not lambing this year but it is now safe to move the rams back in with the ewes. They were super excited (!!!) to be reunited. Things have settled back down now and the three boys have stopped chasing the girls around.

With a little more time on our hands we have been having a good tidy up. I have adopted a strict no plastic policy, so every shred of plastic I find on the smallholding gets collected. We've gone round and picked up all the old bits of wood and half rotten pallets too and enjoyed a rare bonfire. This is a great chance to burn materials which can't be composted, such as the old raspberry canes which I pruned but prefer to burn to limit disease.

The bonfire kept me warm

on a chillier nicmig night.

This was the night of a Supermoon, 

a term which seems to be used

every time there is a full moon these days.

Although my twitching has been curtailed, like many other birders I have discovered a new form of my hobby. It's called nocmigging (nocturnal migration) and involves sitting out in the dark listening for bird calls. There is the option of simply placing a microphone outside and then reviewing the recording in the morning, but I prefer to hear the birds as they fly over. Conditions for this have been perfect. Nights have been warm and dry and the road and skies devoid of engine noise. It has meant many late nights, but late mornings don't really matter at the moment.

It has been fascinating doing this. Firstly I have added seven new species to the list. What flies over in the day is quite different, it seems, to what you see during the day. It has been good to hear owls on territory too. We now have tawnies firmly established alongside the little and barn owls.

As well as the birds, I hear dogs, cows, sheep and even a donkey.
And on the wildlife front there is the occasional rat, barking roe deer and one night I could hear fox cubs excitedly shrieking when they were brought food.
This is a little worrying as we have already lost one chicken which did not go to bed one night and our brown Muscovy girl has been missing for a week.
The turkeys are laying now and the girls do not go up on the fence every night either.

Growing our own food has continued apace too. This is a very busy time of year raising young plants from seed. There is a conveyor belt of seeds and they are now beginning to go in the ground.

I never thought I'd say this, but we could actually do with some rain!

Sue, Boris and the chickens getting involved.

Here we planted calabrese and rat-tailed radish (grown for edible seed pods).

We left the poached egg plants and red dead-nettles in situ,

but took out more persistent weeds like couch grass, docks and creeping buttercup.

Trays of summer salad ready to be planted out.

Swallows and Lambathons

The first swallow soaks up the early morning sun

There is excited chattering above the smallholding once more.

Yay! The swallows have returned. And with temperatures already having reached 24C there should be plenty of insects for them.
That was Sue's wake up surprise for me on Wednesday.

Thursday's surprise was that we have our fourth lamb, an adorable all black single ewe. She was the offspring of badger-face number 00009. This ewe always drops her sprogs without warning.



So the lambathon bit of the blog title is a bit (well a lot) misleading. We have had four lambs - oh, did I forget to tell you about the twins born two days previously to Number 0001.

All are doing well. All were born with no problems for mums or babies. There are three girls and one boy which is a very good ratio. They were all born within our Easter holidays, as planned.


And that's about it.

Oh. They are adorable as ever!

Smallholding - because it's worth it

Today was everything that smallholding should be.
It started with Sue letting the poultry out and doing the morning feed while I finished off some rather rustic protection for my broad bean bed. I wanted to finish this before the escape committee got into the veg beds and scratched up all the Poached Egg seedlings I planted last night to look after the broad beans.

We started early, for the plasterers were due to arrive at 8.30am. We need some remedial work doing in two downstairs rooms, so we shall be spending the next few days in improvised living quarters squeezed between all the furniture which now fills one end of the kitchen and the conservatory (aka the potting shed).

The dogs are quite happy with the new living arrangements

We have been trying to arrange to have this work done for well over a year and have come to the conclusion that plasterers easily beat estate agents. lawyers and even politicians in the charlatan stakes! Not the one we are using I hasten to add. So it will be a great relief to finally get this work done.

Once it is all finished we will be repainting and turning one of the rooms from a bedroom into a communal room for our next exciting plan, hosting volunteers on the smallholding.

We have our first volunteer coming to stay at the end of this month and it now all seems very real.

With the plasterers set to their work, it was back into the garden where I was preparing the bed for some pea seedlings  to grow. Meanwhile Sue was busy with the new chipper shredder which I finally got round to using at the back end of last week (I am scared of power machinery and it often sits quite a while before I pluck up the courage to use it).

Sue was so enthusiastic about this new machine that she totally didn't notice the arrival of our next guests.

And so to our second appointment of the day with the caravan man. We bought a caravan off Facebook a while back in preparation for this venture to give the volunteers a space of their own but had not really worked out all the practicalities of actually using the caravan. But it was all good news. Solar energy won't be a problem, we can use a big gas bottle to power most of the appliances and the caravan man was quite impressed with the caravan.
Not only this, but he is going to look out for a second caravan for us. We don't do things by halves.

It wasn't yet midday but the weather somewhat reflected our day so far - a very foggy start had turned into a gloriously sunny day. All five bee hives came out to make the most of it too.

Sue and I busied ourselves on the smallholding until Sue decided to go into town to stock up for visitors coming later in the week. That plus the fact that the plasterers were getting through quite a lot of coffees and we needed more milk! (We don't yet have a cow)

But Sue's shopping trip was cut short.

I picked some old cabbages and took them down to the ram paddock - the six boys are being very laddish at the moment, full of the joys of spring. They spend most of their time chasing and leaping and butting.


But it was the ewes which caught my attention. One was lying by the hay feeder looking decidedly close to labour, but then I looked at the other of the fat girls to see her water bag hanging out the back. Lambing was upon us!
I don't want to boast, but this was perfect planning. We try to introduce the ram so that lambing happens during our Easter holiday and this was just about perfect timing.

I called Sue to come back in case assistance was required, but ten minutes later I was WhatsApping her a photo of the newborn lamb.
I would have put my life's savings on this ewe having twins but I was wrong. Instead it was one very sturdy ewe lamb.

All the other sheep came over to introduce themselves, but it was the other heavily laden ewe's behaviour which was interesting. She licked the lamb just as if she were its mother and spent the next couple of hours trying to adopt it. Fortunately the lamb, although occasionally confused, bonded with the right mum and was doing all the right things to get its first feed.

For now we have brought mum and lamb and heavily pregnant aunty up to the stable. There was a chilly north-easterly blowing this afternoon and it is easier for us to keep an eye on things if the sheep are inside. I'm sure they would rather be outside though.

So that was pretty much the day done. Just about the perfect smallholding day.

But it's never that straightforward. A strange noise mid afternoon turned out to be one of the turkeys with its head stuck in the gap between the gate and the heras fencing panel. This has never happened before and fortunately the girl managed to free herself when I approached. But half an hour later I heard the same noise with the same result. This time the stupid turkey appeared to injure its neck in its efforts to free itself.
It is now looking pretty sorry for itself. Whether it survives the night or not I wouldn't like to bet.

And there you have it. The many highs (and occasional lows) of smallholding.
I'm sure that with more lambing there will be plenty more ups and downs in the next couple of weeks.

A bit of practical sheep-keeping

Before I get onto sheepy things, I did say I would make more effort ot be aware of Awareness Weeks. This week is National Obesity Awareness week.
There are so many reasons for the rise of this issue. Processed food. Inactive lifestyles. Processed food. Inactive lifestyles. Processed food...
I know that some people have genuine food issues and that is a separate matter.

But most of our (well, not mine) food is manufactured by huge companies who will add anything from sugars and fats to misleading descriptions and marketing, all to make us crave more so they can make more profits. And most of it produced as cheaply as possible with some shocking practices going on, at enormous cost to our Earth and its fauna and flora.

Sermon over.
There is one answer. Grow you own! The food s infinitely better and kinder to the environment and you get free exercise. Win. Win.

Onto the main subject. Sheep. Growing your own sheep is fraught with complications. In general sheep are determined to get ill, keel over and die.
But don't let me put you off. Go for a native breed and they will mostly look after themselves.

I don't do 100% organic with our sheep, only in that I do occasionally worm them with proprietary products and I do spray them for flystrike in the spring. Not to do so would be irresponsible.
I keep these things to a minimum. In the past people used to routinely worm their sheep whether or not there was an issue. Unsurprisingly the worms have become resistant to some of the chemicals.
I don't rely on garlic or homeopathy or anything like that - these are possibly of slight benefit, but not enough to cover the problem properly.
Instead good grazing management is my main weapon. The sheep move pasture on a regular basis and the ground they have been on is given as long as possible to rest. This helps break the life cycle of the worm species.
I plan to move some chickens into the sheep fields too with a mobile chicken coop. Their scratching and pecking will help expose the worm eggs to the elements.

I tend to worm when there are possible indicators of a problem. The main sign is runny poo - known as scours. I am pleased to say that my sheep have very good poo! They can get runny poo from a change of diet too, such as suddenly going on to very lush grass, so it is not always a sig of worms.

At this time of year some of the sheep develop coughs too, which can be a sign of worms. The coughs usually disappear of their own accord, but if it seems to be persistent then I generally take the opportunity to worm the whole flock.
This is just a matter of pouring a small syringe of fluid down their throats. I hold them up while Sue administers.
First task is to get the sheep penned into a small space.
Today was the turn of the five ram lambs who are down the bottom of the land where there is no convenient way to pen them.
So I set up some sheep hurdles, sprinkled some sheep nuts (pelleted food) on the ground inside and waited for them to walk in. It didn't take long. Fortunately the ram lambs are not so wary as their mothers. This is helped by the fact that Rambutan and Flash were bottle fed as babies.

This gives a good opportunity to check their condition too, though I am pretty sure from their running and bouncing and frolicking around the field that there are no major issues.
Flash is all skin and bone, but he has always been the runt and has never put on good growth since he nearly died twice as a young lamb.

Tomorrow we shall repeat this operation with the adults. I hope they behave!

Rambo's Big Day

Autumn medlars

Sunday 11th November 2018
One of last year's Shetland ewes went on her final journey today. Next time we see her she will be in a box and is going straight to a customer. We are however planning on getting her fleece back so we can salt it and send it off to a tannery. This is a new departure for us.

Moving the sheep around has meant that Rambo can be put in with the four breeding ewes. He got to work instantly! We should expect lambs early April next year.

While the trailer was still on we made a couple of straw trips to a nearby farm. Straw bales are remarkably cheap round this way, £1 each for conventional small bales which are so much easier for us to handle.

On the subject of sheep and wool, Sue has been experimenting with dying and has achieved some good results. She is using acid dyes as the rabbits made short work of the natural dye plants I was trying to grow. You simply soak the wool in vinegar and add the chosen dye. You then gradually bring up the heat and boil for 40 minutes with no agitation to avoid the wool felting. A gradual cooling and voila! Dyed wool.

The picture on the left shows Boris 'helping' Sue use her new dyed wool to weave a circular rug.

Separating the rams

I love keeping native breed sheep. They are so much more suitable to my style of smallholding than any of the larger breeds. My chosen variety are Shetland sheep.
For a start, they don't demand acres of lush green grass. In fact they seem to prefer my rougher pasture. Most of all they would like to get in amongst my young woodland where they would for certain make short work of the trees and saplings.

My Shetland sheep demolishing some sow thistle plants I've thrown in for them.

Rambo is the gorgeous boy in the foreground.

Come lambing time, they are not trying to give birth to ridiculously large little monsters which are basically too big to come out, so there are few problems and very few occasions to call the vet (an arm and a leg would seem cheap). This makes lambing time slightly less stressful, for I do not come from a farming background and do not have the experience for this not to be a tremendously worrying time.

The downside is that they do not produce a massive carcass and, despite leaving the young rams entire this year, they would still provide relatively slim pickings if I sent them on their way now. Instead we keep them through to a second year and look forward to what is known as hogget meat.

This brings its own complications too. Firstly they need enough pasture to support the adults and this year's young through the winter. But as mentioned before, they get by on very little so this is not too much of a problem. The bigger problem is that of separating related males and females.
Native breeds have a shorter breeding season than other sheep, but by mid-August the males start getting ideas!

So a few weeks back I erected a short stretch of stock fence to divide my paddocks into two. We already have electric fence, but for the sake of getting to the girls the rams would probably be prepared to take the hit.
Luckily we got enough rain just in time for me to knock in the posts. Prior to that the ground had been like concrete.

My ewes stripping some willow for me.

All the rams have settled in well and Rambo is tolerating the presence of his five sons. The ewes are enjoying the lack of male attention too. They do in fact have one male lurking amongst them but he is not interested as he got the chop last year. He is known as a wether. It is useful to keep one such boy to keep the ram company if he ever needs to be away from all the others.

We will wait till early November before letting Rambo in with the girls. That way we reduce the risk of poor weather at lambing time and if we are lucky lambing will coincide with our Easter holidays. There is no hurry to get the lambs out early in the year as we are not aiming to fatten them up before the grass dies down in late autumn.
When this happens any of last year's ewe lambs (Rambo's daughters) will need to go into a third separate paddock away from their dad and brothers.

Luckily the grass has grown back strong after the early summer drought so there are no problems going into the autumn. I have stocked up on hay for it will be in short supply this year and the price will rise steeply if availability becomes a problem. I hardly need to use any in normal circumstances, but you need to have it in just in case.

Everything A Little Lamb Could Want For... Except A Mum... And Milk

26th May 2018
Bleating Hell
Last year we let the lambs wean naturally, which means just leaving them with their mums until they decide that grass is enough for them or until the ewe decides that enough is enough.
But with the lambing problems this year, far from unique to us, I decided to be on the safe side and take the lambs off the ewes on the early side rather than late so the ewe could build up their strength again.
Shetland lambs start nibbling at everything in sight within a day of being born, mimicking their mums. The four lambs who have been in with the sheep flock are already getting a large part of their nutrition from grass.

It is a different story for Flash and Rambutan though. Rambutan especially has never really enjoyed the taste of grass and has been very reliant on the bottle. Flash, though younger, has a more rounded diet.
But I am pretty sure that neither of them realised when they were fed this morning that it would be their last ever feed. From now on the lambs must be self-sufficient.

All penned up ready for worming and separation

While we were moving everything, we took the opportunity to worm all the sheep and to check them over. Then we carried the lambs up to the paddock by the farmhouse where they met Flash and Rambutan, who they have not seen in a long while.
We then moved the ten adult sheep (Rambo, four ewes and last years lambs) as far up the land as possible. The lambs can still hear the ewes calling and the ewes can still hear the lambs bleating, but the greater the distance apart the better.
Besides I don't like putting young lambs in the furthest paddock for this is where the sheep have previously been chased by dogs.

At the moment it seems that all is working out well. Flash and Rambutan are already eating creep feed and grazing, learning from their new friends. And the fact that these two are more settled down this end and not calling to their mums is helping the other four to settle in.

Settling in well and looking good

Cuddles still required for Flash and Rambutan

Flash tucking into his creep feed

edit This post got stuck in the unpublished pile for a while, so here's an update:
The lambs stopped bleating after a couple of days. Before that there was a constant bleating from the nearest paddock and a deep baaing from the sheep field. Even next door's sheep joined in.
Rambutan quickly learned to eat grass when he saw the others and realised that milk would no longer be on offer. All the lambs took to the creep feed too, a specially formulated pellet to help them make the transition from milk to grass.
The ewes' udders swelled to gargantuan and uncomfortable proportions - I was glad I changed my mind about moving them onto the lushest pasture. This is when mastitis can set in, but they have now subsided again so hopefully all is ok.

Flash and Rambutan have not been without their mishaps though. Little Flash picked up a nasty limp in his back leg. I was away for six days and when I left we were just hoping it would sort itself out - lameness usually does with sheep. And indeed upon my return Flash was walking about right as rain. But Rambutan had been in the wars.
He had got his horn caught up and then managed to rip it off. I wasn't there, but Sue said there was blood everywhere. Anyway, by the time I came back from my little trip everything had healed up nicely.

Shear delight

Monday 14th May 2018
Shearing Day
Next to pantomime, sheep shearing is just about as seasonal a job as you could get.
You don't want it done too early or the sheep will feel the cold. But too far into early summer and they get too hot. More importantly fly strike becomes a real problem.
Luckily we realised early enough that our usual shearer had become unavailable. He got himself a job in Australia so, quite unreasonably I thought, would not be able to shear my sheep this year.
Fortunately we were in time to piggy back on someone else's arrangements.

Last year the sheep were not shorn until the second week of June. They were hot and were in various states of self-shearing. There were clumps of wool all over the paddocks.
So this year we managed to get the job done a few weeks earlier. The lambs came down with the adults, but they don't get sheared. Two weeks later and we might have kept them up this end to wean them.

Shetlands are small, so shearing is quick, but they can be a little feisty at times. One of the ewes gave the shearer's arm a good kick! I was very happy with the shearer we used. He was quick and efficient, but just as importantly his communication was good. It is always a worry that your shearer won't turn up after you have taken time off work and gone to the effort of penning the sheep. It's not easy to book a replacement in a hurry.

All penned up ready for shearing.
I put them in a large pen until the shearer arrives, then narrow it down.

That's Rambo on the floor getting a hair cut. He was calmer this year than usual.

All done and heading back down to the sheep field.

With the shearing done, fly strike is much less of a worry. The shearer offered to apply a spray-on fly strike preventative too, which works out much cheaper and easier than if we did it ourselves. This chemical can be used at shearing, unlike some of the others. The chemical is pretty strong stuff and means the sheep are not organic, but if you have seen fly strike in action you wouldn't want to be pussy footing around with garlic and essential oils! We asked the shearer to check their feet too and trim where necessary. Again, better to do it all at once.
One reason I like having the shearer round is that it gives a good chance for someone who knows what they are doing to give the flock a quick look over. I do check on the health of the Shetlands every day and spend quite a bit of time with the in the field, but apart from Rambo and the lambs I rarely get very close to the others to inspect them closely.

Shearing made it obvious that last year's efforts at castration were only partly successful. Two of the ram lambs will need to be kept away from the females later in the year - it is a good job they will be going off to the butcher before then.
One which for some reason I had fixed in my head as a young ewe is actually a male!! I had begun to have my suspicions. This is quite useful, since a wether (castrated male) is good company for the ram when he needs to be separated from the ewes. Come August they will be coming into season but we don't want Rambo to service the ewes until early November so that we can aim for lambing to be during school Easter holidays. This year we will also have to separate the one female lamb. She can go with the wether while Rambo is in with the older ewes.

It was good to ascertain the condition of the ewes too, especially Ewe 00004 who nearly died earlier in the year. She is still skinny but not disastrously so. Hopefully she will begin to put weight on again quite soon.

Happily settled back in to a new strip of pasture.

There was one other surprise while the sheep were being sheared. The ewe which did not give birth this year looks as though her udders may be swelling up. If so, we will have a very late lamb.We'll see what happens.

Flash News

Tuesday 10th April 2018
Most of today was spent on and off tending to Flash the ram lamb. He has been weak and has not been seen to feed from mum, even though both the other lambs are now suckling well.
He is resistant to bottle feeding too and we have had to keep him going with Lamb Boost, an energy liquid.

Flash is the little one lying by mum's tail

Ewe 0009 and her lambs seem really healthy.
She is tucking into her oats and hay.

Early evening his mouth was no longer warm inside, a sure sign that hyperthermia was setting in. This is the main cause of death in a lambs first days, though I think it is more a symptom than a cause.

Sue brought him into the house and nestled him in a blanket with a hot water bottle. I down-played his chances of survival. But by late evening we were able to put him back with his mum and brothers. If he survives, I would be surprised if we don't end up bottle feeding him.
At the moment, Flash's future hangs in the balance. We are trying to get him to feed every couple of hours and topping up with Lamb Boost. The longer we can keep him alive, the better his chances of getting through.

On a different note, the Muscovies are thoroughly enjoying the fact that the giant puddle has topped itself up again.

Lamb Triplets and Twins Arrive

Monday 9th April
You Might Want to Come Down to the Sheep Field
Main job for the day was to finish constructing the pond which I began digging out yesterday evening. This pond is purely for the ducks, who will soon be moving into the veg plot.
The weather was dull and drizzly, but I decided to ignore getting wet and carry on till I was finished.

Pond dug, liner ready

Lined with old carpet underlay.
Just a precaution as stones are rare in our soil.

In goes the water, straight from the water butt

Filling up nicely

So by midday the pond was well on its way to being finished. I had only been working on it for about six hours. It should be completed before dark... or so I thought.

It was 12:30 when I heard the sound of bleating from the sheep field. I went to investigate and here's what I found.

I phoned Sue, advising her that she might like to come down to the sheep field. While I was away, the geese decided to test the new pond. It seemed to meet with their approval.

We moved Ewe 00010 up to the stables as there was heavy rain forecast overnight. I had already set up a pen in readiness for this moment. When we got there, she promptly gave birth to lamb number three! This is unusual for Shetland sheep. 

The only other time one of our ewes gave birth to triplets we tried to adopt one onto another ewe. It didn't work out and we ended up bottle-feeding. At the time we decided that should the occasion arise again we would supplement feed. This means leaving the three lambs with the ewe, but bottle feeding all three as a top-up. Without this, mum's resources would be overstretched, especially as the lambs grow, and all four would be at risk.

But the ewes are not in tip-top condition this year. It has been a difficult year for lambing for everybody.

By the time everything had settled down it was nudging toward 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I returned to the pond, still determined to push on and try to get it finished.  I just needed to edge it with decking.

But it wasn't long before I was interrupted again. More bleating!

I phoned Sue again. "You might want to come down to the sheep field!"

For there was Ewe 0009, one of our badger-faced Shetlands, tending to a newborn pair of twin lambs. This was the first time that either of the badger-faced ewes had given birth to more than a single lamb. Both looked good and healthy. The badger-faced ewes give absolutely no hints that they are about to give birth. The lambs just appear! I am not complaining.

So five lambs in two and a half hours. 

Sue leads the ewe up to the stables using the lamb as the lure.

I was carrying the other lamb.

Each new birth was accompanied by bleating and baaing all round.

Even the rams were taking a keen interest.

By now the rain had really set in and I was glad to have got both mums and all the lambs safely into the stables. I mixed up some oats for the mums and set up a couple of hay racks. They would be hungry now.

The triplets were struggling to get milk and Sue could not get milk out of one teat. It is essential that the lambs drink in their first few hours, since the first milk contains colostrum from the ewe which transfers all her antibodies to the lambs.
The lambs were small and mum was looking a lot, lot skinnier than she was this morning.
We called a friend more experienced in teat management than us. She could come over and help but I would have to babysit her two grandchildren. Joy!

I survived an hour with a three and a five year old. I had never quite clicked what a poor message Cinderella gives girls about their aspirations in life.

The ewe's teats had cleared though one of the lambs was looking quite weak. Having said that, at any one moment any of the lambs was looking weak.
It was going to be a long night.

For the rest of the evening I busied myself in the kitchen making Chicken Tom Yam soup. One breast from the monster chickens went a long way and I have to say it tasted very nice. I cooked to the background music of a live band, for Sue had brought the Sugarbeats, the Smallholder Club's very own music group, over to the house for their practice.

Regular visits were made to check on the lambs. By now it was apparent that the weakest lamb was the last born of the triplets, one I had already named Flash due to the white streak across the top of his head. Oh, I forgot to say, we had to wait till the last lamb to get a female. All the rest are young rams, which is not the best news. Boys are always more troublesome.

Compared to the newborn lambs, Rambutan at two weeks old is looking like a giant! He had his final feed of the day at midnight. I fed some artificial colostrum to two of the triplets too, just to make sure they got enough of this vital ingredient and to keep them going through the night.
I set the alarm for 4.30am.

That was quite some day.