I hope everyone is doing well. We are almost done with our early lambing group. The ewes started lambing on March 20th and there are four left to go. Hopefully they lamb in the next week before we move the second group into the barn. We lamb in two groups because our barn cannot hold the whole flock at once.
The pregnant ewes stay in their own group. You can see they are pretty round. Some of them find it more comfortable to sit than lie down. After lambing, a ewe moves into her own small pen where she can rest and bond with her lambs.
After a few days, they go into a slightly larger pen where they get used to sharing space with one or two other ewes and their lambs. At this point, the lambs get ear tags and numbers, and the ewes get their feet trimmed. When we run out of space in the little group pen, they get moved into the larger group pen.
The lambs love racing around the big group pen, making it hard for their mothers to keep track of them. We seem to have an extra friendly group of lambs this year.
Thanks for reading, Leith, Mary Kate & Norah MacKenzie