Tails from an Irish Vet: Coming In Like a Lamb

Lambing takes BABY SEASON *crazy hands* to a whole new level. If any of you read my blog (http://armadillowhisperer.wordpress.com/) from this time last year, you'll notice I had a similar post about BABY SEASON at WRR. I'd much prefer this kind of baby season. At WRR, we were telling people on the phone to leave the baby animal alone because the mom was most likely coming back for him and he was better off with his mother than with us. On Willie Fox's sheep farm, however, we were making sure that each ewe had a pair of lambs to rear, whether they were 2 of her own lambs, 1 of her own and a foster lamb, or 2 foster lambs (and once these lambs are grown to 19kg, they're shipped of to market... not exactly what WRR would like to see).

giving the ewe a hand getting the little lamb out.

I was on Willie's farm for 12 days during my spring break in March. (Yes, I realize that it is the end of April and I'm just now posting this, but such is the life of a vet student who lacked motivation to do much more than was necessary by the end of the semester. But now it is an excuse to take a break from studying for final exams... anyway). He and his father run the farm and 2 of his 3 sisters also still live on the 440 acre property west of Dublin in County Meath. They have a flock of close to 900 sheep: mostly ewes with a handful of rams. Willie promised that we (Katrina and I went together) would learn more on his farm in the 2 weeks we were there than 2 weeks worth of lectures, and he certainly delivered on that promise and then some. We had several lectures on sheep production prior to coming to his farm and some on sheep nutrition, but you can't really appreciate the work and timing that goes into the production of the little lambs until you see it in action. I have a whole new appreciation for fresh spring grass because it means less work to feed all the sheep when you can just put them out in the rolling green fields. In the time we were there, we saw and had a hand in the birth of 1330 lambs from 800 ewes. And when I say had a hand in, I really do mean a hand.

Sheep shed

At the height of our time there, about 50-60 lambs would be born a day. A typical day was as follows:
7:15am- wake up
7:35am- breakfast
8am- down to the sheep shed. Check all the group pens for ewes that had lambed. Feed any pet lambs and top up those lambs in the individual pens that either need a suck off of mama or additional milk replacer (formula) if mama isn't producing enough. Feed all the ewes in the group and individual pens with silage, concentrates and water. Check for ewes showing signs of lambing. Begin loading up ewes and lambs to go out to pasture.

group pens (10) with pregnant ewes brought in from the field

10:30am- tea break
11:30am- back down to the shed. Check for ewes lambing. Continue loading sheep to leave the shed. There would usually be around 20-30 ewes each with 1-2 lambs going out to pasture each day and they would be loaded into a small trailer hooked up to either the quad bike or the tractor. Put down fresh hay in the individual pens of the sheep just taken out. Feed the pet lambs and top up the lambs in the individual pens with the mama ewes. Check for ewes lambing.
1pm- Lunch time
2pm- Back down to the shed. Check for ewes lambing. Feed and water all the ewes with concentrates and silage. Rehay the group pens as

teaching the slower lambs how to suckle

Bottle feeding one of the pet lambs before

fostering her off to another ewe

necessary. Feed and check on the lambs. Check the ewes. Give some extra silage and check water.
6pm- Dinner time
My day ended here. Katrina did the evening shifts from half 8 to around 10pm and her morning started at 10. It was a solid day of work. And I loved every minute of it. Yes, it was frustrating at times getting those little guys to suckle but once you got them going you just had to stop and think "Hey, I'm in Ireland on a sheep farm. How cool is this?" And I can't tell you how many times I thought to myself, This would never fly at WRR, but they're all happy and healthy animals, so they must be doing something right.