Tuesday, March 26, 2013
Yellow Fluff.
Today on the farm, we got a few new animals. With spring fling starting in just a few short days (Friday!), and some field trips also coming up this week - we wanted to be prepared. Thats why we got some new baby chicks, and some baby ducklings! We didn't order as many as we normally do,. There are about 5 ducks and maybe 10 chicks, but that is still plenty enough. In all these pictures they are just one day old! I have to say that I love them when we just get them, its the cutest time in their lifetime. When we first get them they are all so tiny that you can fit 3-5 of them in your hand at once. Plus, they are SUPER fluffy. Our ducks and chicks do live in the same place until they get older. Ducks grow faster than the chicks, so they will move out when they get too large for the chicks. For now though, they are all the perfect size. In these pictures it was about 5 minutes after we got them, so they are not even a day old yet. They were born just that morning.
Babies by the Dozen
I finally got some pictures from the farm! You'll be seeing lots of pictures of lambs and baby goats (kids). I don't have much else to say, so just enjoy! I apologize for such awkward picture placement (and some words too), but I'm not sure of the best way to put pictures up on here. So thank you for putting up with it.
Mama & baby :) ~ Nursing!
The two twin lambs above are the ones that I watched give birth. Molly is the mother laying there. She is still down, she can't stand fully yet, but that doesn't mean the lambs can't nurse. They are both attempting to drink at the same time in the picture, but also at times she will lift her but into the air and the two will nurse. It is a spectacular sight. The marbled lamb is my personal favorite. :)
We have a row of four jug pens set up in our sheep pen for all the mom's and there babies. So many babies!
We have twin sonins this year! We had none last year, so I'm pretty excited.
In this picture, this little lamb is attempting to stand up. This is one of the triplet lambs that was orphaned. They are still pretty weak, so getting up is a bit of a struggle. Plus there legs are so long that they wobble around on them, which can be quite cute. They are doing SO much better than before though. All three get bottles, so it is more mouths to feed. But this means we get some bottle lambs, which are always fun. One thing I love about the triplets are there speckled skin, that you can sorta see in this picture. When they grow older they will not have that in there wool, there wool with be all white. But for now they look adorable.
Our one little lamancha hangs out with the french alpines. This little alpine above was a pretty big single that was born. He's a little off white, more of a light brown compared to our normal white ones.
Little lamb snuggling with mama.
I hope you fell in love with all these babies as much as I have. Next will coming naming them all, which might just be my favorite part. Maybe second to feeding them, but that does take a while. We give all our kids, and the three orphaned lambs bottle about twice a day. It involves a lot of cuddling to get them to drink. Soon enough they will be big enough to drink on there own, and will be begging us for milk (which can be a very loud process with so many babies.) If anyone lives in the West Michigan area I would suggest going to Critterbarn.org and checking out our spring fling. It starts this coming friday. The farm will be open for free and you can come see and maybe even feed if you come at the right times our babies. There is tons of other things to do and see on the farm as well, so consider checking it out. Spring Fling will be going on from March 29 - April 6!
The twin lambs above are new borns. They were born about an hour before these pictures were taken. In the picture on the left you can see that we are helping them nurse for the first time. Originally there were three of them, but one was born a still born. It was actually born after the mother passed the after birth, which is a Very rare thing to happen. We've never had anything like it, and it is quite a sad thing in all honest. But the twins that are up above are quite adorable. I love the little one with the white patches on the head. New born lambs are adorable. :)
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| The new born twins needed a little medican |
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| So Many Baby's! This is only one pen of them. |
I tried to take as many pictures of baby goats as I could. These are the best ones (the lighting in the barn is not the best, so some pictures are not the most amazing ever.) We have two pens of goats. One with all our French Alpines, and one with the triplet lambs, nubians, and our twin sonins.
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| This little goat is my personal favorite. It was the one that fell asleep on my lap the first time I fed it. |
We have twin sonins this year! We had none last year, so I'm pretty excited.
One of the triplet lambs. This is the weakest one that has trouble getting up, so she likes to lay around a lot. She sure has some spunk though. Then there is me holding the goat I just fed.
Lambs and kids sure do get along. They are all playmates and sure enjoy each others company. I feel like the lambs may think they are goats ;)
In this picture, this little lamb is attempting to stand up. This is one of the triplet lambs that was orphaned. They are still pretty weak, so getting up is a bit of a struggle. Plus there legs are so long that they wobble around on them, which can be quite cute. They are doing SO much better than before though. All three get bottles, so it is more mouths to feed. But this means we get some bottle lambs, which are always fun. One thing I love about the triplets are there speckled skin, that you can sorta see in this picture. When they grow older they will not have that in there wool, there wool with be all white. But for now they look adorable.
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| SO MANY BABIES! When ever you go in there, you get swamed. |
The french alpine pen is a little more calm. Until you walk in.
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| Little lamb |
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| Babies sure do sleep a lot. |
Little lamb snuggling with mama.
I hope you fell in love with all these babies as much as I have. Next will coming naming them all, which might just be my favorite part. Maybe second to feeding them, but that does take a while. We give all our kids, and the three orphaned lambs bottle about twice a day. It involves a lot of cuddling to get them to drink. Soon enough they will be big enough to drink on there own, and will be begging us for milk (which can be a very loud process with so many babies.) If anyone lives in the West Michigan area I would suggest going to Critterbarn.org and checking out our spring fling. It starts this coming friday. The farm will be open for free and you can come see and maybe even feed if you come at the right times our babies. There is tons of other things to do and see on the farm as well, so consider checking it out. Spring Fling will be going on from March 29 - April 6! Saturday, March 23, 2013
R.I.P. Christmas Tree
Today we took down our Christmas tree. It was a sad sight to see it go. We only kept it up and extra three months... No big deal right? There is now a sad hole where it used to be, but I think it was time. I'm pretty sure we are the only people to ever keep there tree up for this long.
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| RIP Christmas Tree You shall be missed. |
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Stories of Baby's
Tonight was probably one of the best nights of my entire life. It was the first time I have ever seen a lamb born. I've seen one goat born, but that has been it. I was helping my boss teach a class at the farm, and when we went over to look at the mama sheep who were all pregnant - well, needless to say, one was giving birth.
Now a little back story on the ewe (a ewe is a girl sheep, if you didn't know). She is one of the oldest on the farm. Her name is Molly, and she happens to be one of my boss' favorite sheep. A day or two ago, she laid down and made no motion to get back up. She was not dead, she was just too weak and too pregnant to stand. We knew she was ready to birth, so when she did she did so laying down - which is fine. The only problem was that she could not stand up after words to nurse her new lambs. That was a big problem, because the lambs need to get the first milk (or colostrum) from their mother as soon as possible because it has a tone of good bacteria fighting nutrients and things in it. Now Molly did try to stand, many times, but she honestly couldn't. Her back left leg was too weak to put weight on; we found this out later.
She gave birth to twin ewes, which my boss was VERY excited about. She actually started crying when they were born - bless her heart. This was exciting because Molly is getting up in years, so now we have some girls that we can keep to keep her blood line going. The thing I loved, is that one of the lambs was marbled. That means it has patches of black and white wool! We have not had one of those lambs at the farm in a long time. And let me just tell you, it is the most adorable little lamb you will ever see. Sadly this is the ONE night I forget my camera... sorry. Hopefully I will be back soon to take lots of pictures.
Back to the milk though. We had to do a bit of improvising, this meant getting a bail of straw and putting it under Molly. That way her stomach was on top of the bale and she could sorta-ish stand. The lambs did get a good drink of milk, which was a blessing. Also Molly was being a bit feisty which may not seem like a good thing but it was. That meant that she still had some strength left in her, so she will most likely make it. :)
Now while Molly was giving birth, of course this class was going on. The class is for 2-5 year olds, and they are watching a sheep give birth. The parents were ecstatic, and the kids did good too. Now if you have never seen a sheep give birth, its not loud like human's its a very quiet thing. So its not like we were tramatizing the children. In the end, all seemed well.
That was only part of the night though. (I was at the farm until about 10... it was a late night to say the least.) Two little Nubian goats had been born earlier that day. One of them was black, and one of them was brown. I got to feed them, twice :) With new goats, it takes some time (meaning a Long time) to get them to drink all their milk. It also involves cuddling them on your lap to get them to drink. Now that part is not so bad. After the little brown goat had drunk as much as he/she (I don't remember what gender they were) could hold in its tiny belly, the goat fell asleep in my arms. I sure didn't want to move after that, so I just sat there for a bit with it sleeping in my arms. Thats one of those precious moments that I will never forget. Not even a day old baby, asleep in your arms.
Later that night, I tried to feed all five french alpine goats. They were all in one pen together, so when you sit down to feed one, they all try to climb on you. That was a bit of a struggle, but in the end it turned out good. The other thing of that, is that french alpines all look around the same and the five we had all looked the same. One of them was bigger than the rest, because he was born a single, but the rest looked a lot alike. This meant I had to keep track of who I had fed and who I had not. I could only feed one at a time, because they have to sit in your lap as you feed them to get them to drink. All's good that ends well though.
One last event stuck out to me, and this one isn't the happiest. Probably because its the hardest to write about. When you live/work on a farm, there are always learning moments. Now this is one of them. I don't write this so that we can 'point fingers' (as my boss frazed it), but so that we can all learn from this. Its not to criticize how awful our farm is either. I'm pretty sure anyone who lives/works on a farm can tell you, mistakes happen - no matter how hard you try to prevent them. That really applies to life as well, but I can see it at the farm as well. Anyways, the story.
At the farm, we separated our sheep into two groups. Some are in the back, and will give birth in June. The other group is in the barn and are all giving birth now. So they were bred at two different times. Somehow, one that we bred for the first group was switched with one from the second group. The problem with this is that the first group (that is birthing now) gets extra feed to help with the lambs growth. That means that the one switched, that actually was pregnant now, did not get the extra feed. We caught the switch about a week ago, but the lambs were born on Sunday night.
They were triplets, little speckled things, but we think they were born about a week too early. Due to a number of complications, we lost the mother. She had a hard bag, and the malnutrition, and possibly some other bacterias there was just no hope. As of now, the three lambs are still alive. At first, it was bad to be honest, but they are doing a lot better. One of the lambs got adopted by another mom who only gave birth to a single, but tonight we found that the mother was rejecting the lamb so we had to go back to being a bottle baby. The lambs are doing MUCH better, but they still have a ways to go. I got to help feed them, and they are just precious. I'm praying they will make it, and so far things are looking good. The only thing is the little girl who is the weakest of the bunch. But we did get her to stand tonight, which is a HUGE improvement.
To sum this all up, tonight was amazing. I would say I can't even put it into words, but I just did. I'm also just glad that everyone survived.... there were times that I wasn't sure. Hopefully the babies will keep coming, and be even more healthy. Hopefully I'll be able to take some pictures asap, cause they are adorable and sadly they will not stay that small forever. So, goodnight to all and take the babies advice and get lots of rest :) - they sure do sleep a lot.
Now a little back story on the ewe (a ewe is a girl sheep, if you didn't know). She is one of the oldest on the farm. Her name is Molly, and she happens to be one of my boss' favorite sheep. A day or two ago, she laid down and made no motion to get back up. She was not dead, she was just too weak and too pregnant to stand. We knew she was ready to birth, so when she did she did so laying down - which is fine. The only problem was that she could not stand up after words to nurse her new lambs. That was a big problem, because the lambs need to get the first milk (or colostrum) from their mother as soon as possible because it has a tone of good bacteria fighting nutrients and things in it. Now Molly did try to stand, many times, but she honestly couldn't. Her back left leg was too weak to put weight on; we found this out later.
She gave birth to twin ewes, which my boss was VERY excited about. She actually started crying when they were born - bless her heart. This was exciting because Molly is getting up in years, so now we have some girls that we can keep to keep her blood line going. The thing I loved, is that one of the lambs was marbled. That means it has patches of black and white wool! We have not had one of those lambs at the farm in a long time. And let me just tell you, it is the most adorable little lamb you will ever see. Sadly this is the ONE night I forget my camera... sorry. Hopefully I will be back soon to take lots of pictures.
Back to the milk though. We had to do a bit of improvising, this meant getting a bail of straw and putting it under Molly. That way her stomach was on top of the bale and she could sorta-ish stand. The lambs did get a good drink of milk, which was a blessing. Also Molly was being a bit feisty which may not seem like a good thing but it was. That meant that she still had some strength left in her, so she will most likely make it. :)
Now while Molly was giving birth, of course this class was going on. The class is for 2-5 year olds, and they are watching a sheep give birth. The parents were ecstatic, and the kids did good too. Now if you have never seen a sheep give birth, its not loud like human's its a very quiet thing. So its not like we were tramatizing the children. In the end, all seemed well.
That was only part of the night though. (I was at the farm until about 10... it was a late night to say the least.) Two little Nubian goats had been born earlier that day. One of them was black, and one of them was brown. I got to feed them, twice :) With new goats, it takes some time (meaning a Long time) to get them to drink all their milk. It also involves cuddling them on your lap to get them to drink. Now that part is not so bad. After the little brown goat had drunk as much as he/she (I don't remember what gender they were) could hold in its tiny belly, the goat fell asleep in my arms. I sure didn't want to move after that, so I just sat there for a bit with it sleeping in my arms. Thats one of those precious moments that I will never forget. Not even a day old baby, asleep in your arms.
Later that night, I tried to feed all five french alpine goats. They were all in one pen together, so when you sit down to feed one, they all try to climb on you. That was a bit of a struggle, but in the end it turned out good. The other thing of that, is that french alpines all look around the same and the five we had all looked the same. One of them was bigger than the rest, because he was born a single, but the rest looked a lot alike. This meant I had to keep track of who I had fed and who I had not. I could only feed one at a time, because they have to sit in your lap as you feed them to get them to drink. All's good that ends well though.
One last event stuck out to me, and this one isn't the happiest. Probably because its the hardest to write about. When you live/work on a farm, there are always learning moments. Now this is one of them. I don't write this so that we can 'point fingers' (as my boss frazed it), but so that we can all learn from this. Its not to criticize how awful our farm is either. I'm pretty sure anyone who lives/works on a farm can tell you, mistakes happen - no matter how hard you try to prevent them. That really applies to life as well, but I can see it at the farm as well. Anyways, the story.
At the farm, we separated our sheep into two groups. Some are in the back, and will give birth in June. The other group is in the barn and are all giving birth now. So they were bred at two different times. Somehow, one that we bred for the first group was switched with one from the second group. The problem with this is that the first group (that is birthing now) gets extra feed to help with the lambs growth. That means that the one switched, that actually was pregnant now, did not get the extra feed. We caught the switch about a week ago, but the lambs were born on Sunday night.
They were triplets, little speckled things, but we think they were born about a week too early. Due to a number of complications, we lost the mother. She had a hard bag, and the malnutrition, and possibly some other bacterias there was just no hope. As of now, the three lambs are still alive. At first, it was bad to be honest, but they are doing a lot better. One of the lambs got adopted by another mom who only gave birth to a single, but tonight we found that the mother was rejecting the lamb so we had to go back to being a bottle baby. The lambs are doing MUCH better, but they still have a ways to go. I got to help feed them, and they are just precious. I'm praying they will make it, and so far things are looking good. The only thing is the little girl who is the weakest of the bunch. But we did get her to stand tonight, which is a HUGE improvement.
To sum this all up, tonight was amazing. I would say I can't even put it into words, but I just did. I'm also just glad that everyone survived.... there were times that I wasn't sure. Hopefully the babies will keep coming, and be even more healthy. Hopefully I'll be able to take some pictures asap, cause they are adorable and sadly they will not stay that small forever. So, goodnight to all and take the babies advice and get lots of rest :) - they sure do sleep a lot.
Friday, March 15, 2013
French Alpine Twins!
On Wednesday the 13th, 2013 - Twin French Alpines were born on the farm. The one above is a little girl who has a floppy ear, and is pretty much the cutest thing I have ever seen. The other one is a little boy (in the next set of two pictures he is the one on the right.) Sadly they were both born a bit sickly. They would not drink their milk, so they've been tubed a few times now to get the milk to them. I'm not sure what they have, or if they have anything, or what is wrong but they seem to be doing a bit better. When I walked in there they were laying down, but then they soon stood up and started wagging their little tails at me :) So they seemed pretty happy. Hopefully they will get better at taking the milk, and then everything will be good to go. The little boy is smaller than his sister, which I find quite adorable. When he stood up, he arched his back to stretch and then hobbled around for a bit. I nicknamed him a acho because when I sneezed (don't worry I turned far away from them, so I wouldn't get any of the sneeze on them.) he jumped. So his name is not acho, but thats what I'm going to call him. I thought I could nickname the girl flopsy, because of the adorable ear she has, but I find it a bit too cheesy - even for a goat. They are the first goats born on the farm this year, and now I can't wait for more to come!!! This is only one of the reasons that I love spring, it is my favorite season after all. Hopefully there will be more baby's soon to keep you updated with :D
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Pre-Spring
Two weeks ago, we got some new friends at the Critter Barn. In all these photos the bird, and the bunnies are all only one week old. They are a bit bigger now, but still as adorable :) I don't really have much to say today, I just wanted to post some pictures of the animals. With spring approaching the farm, everyone is getting ready for the new babies that are going to be born any time now. I can't wait! :D
There is a set of triplet lops that were born. Each one if a different color. One brown, one tan, and one multicolored. I have a picture of each somewhere on this post, and they are each so adorable + tiny. My favorite part about the baby lops are there ears. Also the fact that they just fit in the palm of my hand.
New ducks and chicks as well. They are cute when this small, but personally as they grow I believe they get uglier. Thats not the happiest thing to say about these guys, but its the truth - in my eyes at least.
Cooper update! Look at him, he's getting so big!!!! He needs to stop growing, NOW. He had tripled his weight sense we got him, or at least that is what the vet said. He's still as curious as ever though.
There is a set of triplet lops that were born. Each one if a different color. One brown, one tan, and one multicolored. I have a picture of each somewhere on this post, and they are each so adorable + tiny. My favorite part about the baby lops are there ears. Also the fact that they just fit in the palm of my hand.
New ducks and chicks as well. They are cute when this small, but personally as they grow I believe they get uglier. Thats not the happiest thing to say about these guys, but its the truth - in my eyes at least.
This duck would NOT stop quacking, even for the picture.
Cooper update! Look at him, he's getting so big!!!! He needs to stop growing, NOW. He had tripled his weight sense we got him, or at least that is what the vet said. He's still as curious as ever though.
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