This morning Nigel went to let the Dorset's and their lambs out into home field, as it was sunny and still..... he even let out Ellie to see what she and the other's would do, and I came upon the scene over an hour later........ he had had such fun!

Three of the mums, Dora, Phoebe and Tabatha had been in separate pens until today, so they are well bonded with their lambs...... Ellie has been in a pen next to her mum, {Tabatha} and her sister, so she still has contact with them both, all be it on the other side of a gate, this has been deliberate to keep her safe, but close. What happened today was really unexpected!

Ezmie, Molly and Louisa have been in the field before, with their tribe, but for the others it was first outing as a family, so they were all delighted to be outside.  All took their lambs over the stone slab bridge which straddles the brook, except Phoebe and her triplets.... she took her time to make sure they all knew where she was and didn't get lost... Dora took her lambs to the top of the field to keep them under control....... but there was one lamb who got them all playing today.. 

Ellie has been walking round the perimeter with me on a daily basis, so she is not frightened of what must feel like a vast landscape... Nigel said she left him, went up to the biggest gang of lambs and started to bounce... then she started to prance like a tiny gazelle, a really happy action which promotes joy and fun throughout the group, and encourages them all to join in........ it didn't take long for them to get the hang of it and they all started to rush around and play together....... bonkers! 

The other real surprise today was Tabatha....... she had called to Ellie to make sure that she didn't go too far, obviously still having some motherly instinct towards her. I am overjoyed to see this because it means that we can let Ellie loose in the field with the flock and she will be integrated and safe with them, and not be looked upon as an outcast or something strange....... she will need me as a source of food and cuddles, but she'll be brought up as a sheep.... Hurrah! 

When I arrived, she was walking down the field behind Tabatha, in step with her sister Charlie... and when she saw me she came to have her bottle..... We brought them all back into the barn, but took off all the dividing gates to make it open plan, so that the only pen left was Ellie's. All the mums sorted themselves and their lambs out and found individual corners to settle in........ its so much easier for all concerned.. and now all the lambs can play together too...... except one... which I can't risk... but she can see them from the top of her bale of straw, where she plays king of the castle and she does bounce around her pen to join in, so it's ok!

This morning we had arranged to have all the sheep scanned.  It is the first time that we have done this, but the numbers we now have warrant it for to be forewarned is to be forearmed for when we start to lamb again at the end of February... it's helpful to know what's coming if you can.

The scanner is a device on the end of a cable and linked to a screen, all run from a car battery.  There is a little ramp leading to a holding frame where each sheep stands off the ground, so that the person scanning can hold the device between the  ewe's  back legs and under her uterus.  

Any lambs show up as little moving white blobs surrounded by black.. the black is either the space between them so the number can be counted, or may show that a ewe is empty.  Our sheep are rather well fed, so it seems that we have rather too many triplets on the way....... we don't really want triplets at all, as a ewe is designed to have 2 lambs not 3.  It can lead to one being left behind, as with Ellie for example, and if we take them off, its so much work.... we don't have enough singles to mother them all on, and of course it's a matter of timing as to whether this can be done anyway..... so at least we know?  

Daisy May has been a bit under the weather, with a lack of appetite and a runny bottom.... we kept her inside with her best friend Socks, and a day of hay and water has sorted her out..... she's back outside and much better.

Ellie is doing so well....... she's getting fatter, and is now eating solids in the form of lamb nuts, with her mother Tabatha and the other ewes eating hay around her, she's cottoning on brilliantly!... She's also developing quite a vocabulary.. there's "hello" ...... there's "I'm very hungry now.. Feed Me!"... there is a murmur of "pick me up and love me" and her breathing changes to an almost inaudible little pant when she's being cuddled... so I match it and she goes to sleep........ its the same quiet noise I make to the ewe's..... it settles them when they're anxious and helps gain their trust. Don't know what I'm saying but its obviously no too rude!

There is a day in a lamb's life when they are introduced to the wide world... some are sooner than later. Ezmie and Louisa have already had several hours in the field with their lambs, but the weather has been so dreadful that we have kept the younger lambs inside.... 

However this morning, it was fine for a while so after giving her a large breakfast, I decided to take Ellie out into the field for a look round. 

I popped her out into the last bay in the barn, where I keep all the paraphernalia, buckets, chair, birthing equipment etc. while I secured everyone else in... Ellie stood close but was also intrigued with the new sights and smells.... then I opened the gate to the big wide world.... she walked out with me tentatively, with her shoulder touching my wellie... and we walked across the yard to the field gate, unlatched it and let ourselves in......... this prompted much interest from the gang in the field, who raced down to see if there was any food available.. I picked Ellie up, so she didn't get spooked and started to walk up the field, and over the stream, followed by the 12 gimmers ........ 

We continued until all but one had become disinterested, so I put Ellie down and introduced her to Daisy May..... Daisy was appalled that I had another lamb, and after touching noses, looked up and me in disgust and went to join Socks, her best friend......... so Ellie and I went up to the top of the field to say hello to Dudley and Vincent, who are in a separate garth, then over to the other side and down again...... Ellie followed behind, I couldn't see her, but could feel her as she kept in contact with my boots all the way round, only getting frightened once... I reassured her with a "come on" as we went, and didn't pick her up again until we were back in the barn!  She was a complete poppet, settling down again in the familiar surroundings of her pen... It's a big deal for someone so small, so we'll have another go tomorrow to build her confidence!  

I spent 7 days beginning on the 15th December, as the weeks Tweeter on @SmallholdersUK and this week has been really busy so its nice to be saying hello again!  I thought I'd better report back about Little Ellie..... 

From the day I removed her from her mum, she has grown in confidence and in stature..  She was weak and shaking the day I adopted her, and was so grateful to be rescued. She sat my arms, shut her eyes and shook. I had brought a bottle with me and she drank it very slowly, but it warmed her and she felt better, I had held her for ages until she poked her head up, stuck her nose under my chin and snuggled in for the duration, a place she has chosen to be ever since.. 

In the last week she has really improved, her little spine has disappeared and her little body has put on a lovely warm layer.... she has grown in size, and weight, and is just like any other lamb, leaping around and jumping off the bale of straw that doubles as a seat in her pen......  We feed her every 3-4 hours which is between 6 and 7 feeds a day except at night when she goes for about 7 or 8 without a feed, but that's fine because she also gets a good sleep..... 

The first bottle of the day is guzzled with a sort of pumping action... Ellie spreads her front lets to give more stability and sometimes does the same with the rear, and then sucks for England!... once she's finished, she runs round my legs until I bend down and offer to stroke her, this always results in her leaping into my arms.... having a cuddle is the best bit of her day, and she has as many of these as she has bottles........ probably more actually.... and once she stops frantically nosing my face, soon settles down with her nose under my chin for as long as I have time to spend with her..... She's adorable.. and I hope she grows into a fully grown sheep..... More pics soon!! 

Now this past week has also been bonkers so....... we have run out of time with all these antics, Christmas has just sneaked up on us...  I want to wish everyone a very Happy Christmas, and a prosperous new year...... And I'd like to thank all those who have been following my blog...  I really enjoy writing it and love the reactions from you.......... Take care and have a good one!

When I did my last feed yesterday, I was confident that everyone was happy, fed and ready for Nigel's last call at about 11.00...  I intended an early night, and had been in bed over an hour when he got home in quite a state....

He had found Tabatha out of her pen, the end gate was open, with Charlie and Ellie wandering round.. he gathered them up but couldn't find Davinia.... until he spotted her under the hay rack in the pen... warm and relaxed, but very very still...... oh no, not just still but lifeless...... he tried without success to revive her.... Whatever had happened could only just have happened and he was too late...

He secured Tabatha, Ellie and Charlie back inside, after feeding the lambs a bottle to make sure they got through the night, then came home to tell me the awful news... we discussed it.. got very upset and decided that perhaps Tabatha had sat down too close to her and smothered her by mistake... We went back to the barn to check that Ellie who is smaller than her sister was ok... decided to put the whole family into to top end of the barn with lots of space and then came home. The only positive we could see was that Tabatha might get on better with 2 lambs instead of 3....

This morning we both went early... Tabatha was full of beans as was Charlie, but Ellie was crouched alone, cold, empty, fearful, shaking, and cried out when she heard my voice, I picked her up and she was really weak... We offered her to her mums teat, and she didn't respond... she just hunched up and shook, her mum was really dismissive, kicking out and almost trampling her under foot... we turned Tabatha up so Ellie could drink safely...... she was terrified..... I removed her....... most farmers would make a mum take a lamb, but this morning Ellie looked so pathetic that I got the milk out of my pocket and fed her... she took it all very slowly..... then shut her eyes and snuggled into my fleece, shuddering... far from the barn monster with the cheek of the day before..

We constructed a pen just for her, made a nest in the hay and straw, then put her in and went home... Had the death the night before been an accident, or had it been something more sinister... Tabatha loves Charlie, feeds her far more and takes more care of her, she's become much bigger as a consequence..... Was this because I help feed them all, and Tabatha naturally chose to look after the biggest of her lambs? Do they smell different? Could I have somehow instigated this situation?  Did Tabatha kill Davinia? Had she tried to kill Ellie? 

When I went back to feed Ellie, mid morning, she was just where I'd left her, and called to me. She was still shaky but drank her milk a little quicker, nibbled my chin all round, then snuggled down and went to sleep again..... after a few minutes I put her back into her nest.... and got on with my day.. calling back with her lunch 3 hour later... she was still in her nest again, but got up, called to me and came to meet me, circling my wellies... she drank her lunch at a much better rate of knots... and sat in my arms looking round... She must be missing her little sister, they spent all their time together. She was being called by her mum and sniffed through the rail, but she didn't respond at all.  Afternoon tea was even better, I even think she looked fatter and at 7.30 she was perky and much brighter... she was looking at her big sister in the next pen, so I made another nest in some hay, so they could sleep next to each other, but safe from being battered... I popped her in and she snuggled down, looking at Charlie through the gate... Charlie was talking to her... They went to sleep together... Nigel will go for a last visit tonight, and then I'll have another early morning!!!! 

Phoebe was the last Dorset to lamb, and we had hoped that she would be easy as all the others with the exception of Ezmie have been a nightmare!

It was early afternoon when she started to show the first signs, but hadn't started to strain. She'd been so calm, and as the others had taken a while, I left her in these early stages to go home and have a cuppa.  Nigel was at home too so we returned to the barn about 45 mins later.   Horror of horrors, there was a foot and a head poking out of the back end of Phoebe.... Nigel jumped in, took control and lambed this first with a shoulder back... one legged... that's the lamb not Nigel... all ok and the lamb was just fine with no ill effects........

Next he went in and found two front lets, bringing them forward and locking them into place..... trouble was there wasn't a head to be found that belonged to them! I had a look after securing a lambing rope round each hoof... its so easy to loose legs when lambing and you can't deliver without them, so if your going to push everything back in, its sensible to rope the feet first then you've always got them! 

Well I couldn't find a head either........ Nigel had another go and we both started to panic....Oh goodness, was this a deformity?  Nige said he'd go to fetch Julia, his uncle's wife, a farmer with decades of experience, and they live a few minutes away...... they arrived back and found that the lamb was "looking up it's own arse" so to speak..... which is why we couldn't find its head.. Julia found it, brought it forward and lambed it without any further delay.... it had been in some distress as it had poo'd itself... however it was fine and alive! Julia went in again and found a third lamb..... smaller, but very much alive...  Its the nice little clean one!

As Phoebe had taken a bit of a battering, I gave her an antibiotic and some of Dora's special injection... we have a bottle... and then a nice meal with a clean bucket of water to follow up........ ewe's are always very thirsty when they've cleaned and dried their lambs...... I think they must taste horrible!!!!!

So this picture may look rather gruesome, but they are all alive, and all cleaned up beautifully.....I put them like this so that Phoebe could see them all and tend to them before they started to get up and move about..... they all had some warm colostrum, both from mum and me, and tonight they are all dry, fed and asleep in a warm little bundle... Phoebe is delighted and feeling ok too.......  

More pictures tomorrow! and hopefully some sleep tonight as I don't have to get up so early in the morning now that everyone has lambed! It'll be the first time in over a month...... I'm off for a bath and an early night........ xxx

We had one Poll Dorset left to lamb at the beginning of the day, therefore a pen was required!  All the sheep were hungry this morning so I wasn't expecting any action today.. so I thought it was time for Tabatha and the girls to be unleashed onto the rest of the inhabitants in the barn.... I removed the gate separating Ezmie and Louisa's gang from the rest and then opened the gate for Tabatha to mix in... everything went ok for the first half an hour until I stepped back in... as I bottle feed the triplets, they know me very well but I wasn't expecting them to follow me around instead of their mum!  This resulted in Molly taking umbrage with Tabatha, and a battle broke out.......... 

I stood back as they need to sort it out themselves, and watched as the 3 lambs hid in safe places, well all except Charlie who was enjoying her new found freedom and started leaping off the bales of straw that we have to segregate informal areas...... then Ezmie joined in for a couple of butts. I'd had enough removing Molly from the situation by gently putting my hand under her chin... she submitted immediately ........ Calm descended fortunately, then Phoebe started to lamb........ 

There wasn't time to clean a pen so I re-strawed the double pen where Tabatha has been living and Phoebe strolled in, unaided, as she could see it would be much more restful there......... more about her later.......

Meanwhile, back with Tabatha, she couldn't keep control of her lambs at all, Nigel had arrived by this time, so we made a corner pen in the barn and penned her up with Davinia and Ellie, who are suffering with Charlies greed...... leaving Charlie on the outside until the little one's had their fill...... we will do this until they catch up a bit and I'll feed her instead of all three,...... Tabatha can regain control of them!....... 

Now lots more has happened today, so I'll put it on a separate page... It'll be easier to fathom.......... 

Hope you're enjoying our early lambing... and thanks for @SmallholderUK for inviting me to be their weekly Tweeter this week! This is my first day...... if you want to follow our normal Twitter page, follow Woolnweave whenever you like...... and you can find us on Facebook too under Fabric of the Field or Clare Gardiner... Please Like us and tell your friends! xxx

Nigel had gone out for the day so after an uneventful visit to the lambing shed at 6.15 am, I returned mid morning to check that everyone was ok...... Dora didn't want anything to eat, a sure sign that lambing is imminent. We hadn't got a spare pen as Tabatha was still taking up both spaces with her triplets, so I constructed a makeshift one and she, very kindly went straight in..... I love our sheep, they are so well mannered. 

I found some jobs to do until Dora started pawing at the ground, then went home for to ring Nigel to keep him informed and to the garage so I didn't run out of fuel. On returning to the barn, there was much straining going on but none of the obvious signs of labour... the little balloon of fluid was no where to be seen and there was no discharge at all....... Very odd?   

I went in and had a gentle feel round inside, there was a mass of what felt like jelly? After another half an hour I did the same, with the same result.. no feet, no nose in fact no lamb at all? I went home and phoned the vet....... Amy would come from Hawes, a 20 minute journey.... I went back again to wait.... Amy duly arrived and confirmed that Dora was definitely in labour and the "jelly" I could feel was the outside of the uterus...... Dora was suffering from "Ring Womb" a complaint when the cervix does not dilate at all... Amy could get one finger in it and it wasn't going to open.......... this meant a Caesarean Section if lives were to be saved.

We got Dora on her side, and while I made sure she stayed there, Amy shaved her side, an area appox 400 mm high and 300 mm wide, then washed it in a pink solution... then she sprayed the area with surgical spirit. Next several injections were given in a vertical line where the incision would be made to numb any pain. Amy then washed herself in cold water because it was all we had, and then arranged her instruments and equipment, covering the whole sheep in a plastic sheet except her head, in which she made a rectangular cut out over the area of the incision.  The incision was about 9 inches long, skin first, then the layers of muscle until the side of the uterus was visible through a smaller slit.... I won't go into the graphics of what Amy did next but 2 huge live lambs were delivered... she put them next to her expecting them to lay where they'd been put while the stitching was done, layer by layer!  

Trouble was the lambs had different ideas, so we spent the next 20 mins fighting them off...... while poor Dora lay still and waited for us to finish... They tried to get over us and under us... looking for teats in all sorts of personal places!! Eventually the stitching was completed, more surgical spirit was sprayed over the area and more injections to make sure that any potential infection was fought......... this will continue for the next 5 days......... Finally a good coverage of foot spray, a double whammy of infection control.

We both got up, straightened our cold bones and collected all the equipment, shaved wool etc, and gave Dora her lambs... The picture above was taken just about 20 mins later... both lambs feeding.... I did give them some Colostrum as I find it gives new lambs a real boost...  and by the time Nigel and I went to bed the little gimmer (Amy of course) and her brother (Julius) (couldn't be anything else) were both up and running!

I started to help Tabatha with her lambs the minute they were born with a nice warm lunch of colostrum, making sure that they had all had a fair share......... then a bottle of milk between them just to keep them topped up every 3-4 hours until I know that mum is coping....... It usually takes a day or two for lambs to understand  what the bottle is, so that we can stop picking them up and "making" them take it....... All three girls understood by the third feed yesterday, only 6 hours after being born and today they are pestering me by butting my knees for milk every time I go near..... its lovely... they've not quite beaten the record, that was Curley Hamster...... I never did pick her up... and it was only 2 hours after she was born when I offered her a bottle........ and she's still a gannet!

.......... oh yes... and we have names............ The first born and heaviest lamb is Charlotte, of course its Charlie already, she spends much of her time sleeping and doesn't even bother to get up for her share of milk.... the second has a really pretty face, with beautiful fluffy white wool round her eyes... she's called Davinia, as promised, no one has ever named a lamb after our vet before... so its a first... and last but not least is our little teeny weeny... who is one of the wickest lambs I've ever seen.. she's going to be trouble and she's called Ellie! She's already turning into a favourite ..... a proper poppet and full of character! 

More pics later........