Ridgetop - our place and how we muddle along

[Sequestered Ridge Ranch]

Now remember don't do like my wife and call it Wacko, it's Waaaaco
There is a Waco, MT between here and Billings and first time I heard her pronounce it I tried my hardest to not laugh, but it slipped.

 

[Ridgetop]

DGS1's confirmation was very nice. The bishop was an amusing guy and had a lot of good jokes with the congregation and kids. Beautiful mass and ceremony. Then we all went out to lunch where we all ate too much. After lunch we decided we all needed naps so everyone went home and rested. At 7 pm we went to play MahJong with Aunt Louise, and DD1's family. We had a great time.

On the way over we met one of the neighbors. They had bought the house a couple years ago and just moved in last year. She was sorry to hear that we are moving to Texas because she likes looking out the window and seeing the sheep in the hillside. She agreed that California is becoming difficult to live in and said they were thinking about moving out of state too. Told her we would be back for a couple months this summer for medical reasons but that our son and DDIL would be living in the house. She told us that a pack of 4 dogs had attacked a couple walking their dogs on Wheatland and a car driving along has rescued them and taken them to the hospital. The man was very badly bitten in the leg. She said it was the second attack in the past month. Maybe those dogs are what our dogs have been barking about for the past few weeks.

And lambing begins on schedule. Snowflake lambed on the 18th. She was due on the 21st. She lambed on schedule as if her lambs had still been alive. Her lambs probably had died in utero when she was injured since they looked preemie. GR39 had twin rams this evening. The crazy thing was that 100123 refused to leave the lambs and is now in the barn jug with GR39 and the lambs. I went to check on them and 123 stood guard and stamped at the dogs while GR 39 ignored the dogs. LOL I checked to see if GR39 was out of 123 which might explain her attachment but she isn't. 123 is a ewe I bought from Paul Lewis just before he sold out. She is a great big solid ewe, has no udder, and doesn't look bred. She is very attached to those lambs though. I think she may have wanted to steal them. She will go in with the open ewes later to be bred if she doesn't lamb. With lambing starting now, I am hoping that at least half of the ewes will have lambed when they are loaded in the trailer which will be safer than ewes trying to lamb on the road. We will paint brand the lambs same as their mamas. A couple of the ewes look to be carrying triplets or VERY BIG lambs! If triplets, I may put the ewe lambs on bottles and transport them separately. I like bottle babies since they tend to stay super friendly. Transporting new bottle lambs in a dog crate would be safer for them than possibly being trampled in the trailer. We aren't moving anyone into the jugs yet since we have more ewes lambing than we have jugs. We will move them in for a few days once they lamb. I am thinking about taking down the interior panes and just having a large open in the barn for the ewes who have lambed since we only have 5 jugs and 14 ewes still to lamb in the next week. We are waiting to see who lambs next.

 

[Ridgetop]

Yesterday 2 more ewes lambed. In the afternoon GR27 was bawling and showing the water bag. Then it burst and she was still wandering around, bawling and licking up the dripping from the water bag. DS1, DD2 and I got her in the barn into a jug and I checked her, but the lamb was way up inside so couldn't pull it out. DS1 scolded me for checking her and said that I tend to try to pull lambs that don't need to be pulled. We left her alone, and a couple hours later she had a runty little ram lamb gasping for breath on the ground. I went in and cleaned his face and she got to work cleaning him. He was up in about 15 minutes and nursing so I went back inside. Late last night still no second lamb but she was pawing the ground and still stringing so left her alone. This am there was a second ram lamb was on the ground dead with the afterbirth attached.

The second ewe 8219 was off by herself laying down most of the day in the middle of the field. Just before feeding time she had a Lamb ON THE EDGE OF THE DROP! I went down to retrieve it and coax her up to a safer area. Like a dummy I didn't take my crook and started slipping and sliding around. I found a stick and used it to keep my balance. DDIL2 saw me and came down to help me carry the lamb up the hill. DS1 had come out to feed and said to just go straight to the jug. It was a nice size ewe lamb. An hour or so later she had a smaller ram lamb with no trouble and passed the afterbirth.

This year the lambs have been a lot smaller. With all the forage we cut back on their hay and it seems to make a difference in size of the lambs. They are active so we may start doing this every lambing, since no one has had a problem with super big lambs yet.

All the April lambs so far have been out of Moyboy. Not sure if Lewis settled any ewes, although some of his ewes were showing udders, as were some of Jr's. Haven't gotten the brucellosis tests yet so hopefully more ewes will drop their lambs before we ship. I know ewes have lambed successfully in trailers before, but it is not my idea scenario. At least with the lambs being smaller I am hoping no one will have any dystocia if they lamb on the trailer.

 

[SageHill]

Sorry about that ram lamb. Keep doing things YOUR way - you've got it down to a science. 👍 - if you can help and want to why not???!??

 

[Baymule]

Smaller lambs are easier. Y’all are on the right track.

 

[Ridgetop]

Two more ewes lambing today. While the one was lambing I went down and cleaned 2 jugs. 8189 had had split twins. DGD1 Elizabeth went down and picked up the twins and moved them, followed by their mother, in the barn jug. We moved the extra ewe (that wanted to steal 8219's twins and followed her into the jugs) out along with BL29 who was in a jug for a problem. I need to clean out the jug that BL29 was in now because after we moved 8189 up I took a look around the field, and another ewe was down in the bottom corner of the hill in the corner starting to lamb.

Keep going girls!

 

[Ridgetop]

BL12 has one ewe lamb out of Lewis. He was able to settle at least one ewe. I will keep this ewe lamb. Hoping BL12 will have a second lamb but not so far. She is in the barn. Will check again before I shower and go to bed.

 

[Ridgetop]

Just ran down and checked BL12. No second lamb and the first one was small. She still looked big. She was standing up and nursing her lamb, and hadn't passed the afterbirth. Something made me go into the barn to take a closer look. Almost missed it but there was a nose showing! She had lambed a couple hours ago so not a good scenario. Ran up and got DH to come down to hold her. She was moving around so much I took the first lamb out of the pen for safety. DH got her head but she jumped around and twisted his knee. DS1 was sick but had come down with DH. He stepped into the pen and held her while DH held the first lamb. The second lamb was larger than the first one and was stuck with front legs all the way back. I managed to get the head out, then found a front leg and pulled. Out came a second ewe lamb! It didn't look alive but twitched so I quickly cleaned off its head. DH handed me the snot sucker and I got a lot of mucous out of its throat and nostrils. It was still not moving much so I did the Dr. Pol cold water thing - splash cold water on the motionless newborn and Presto! A miraculous recovery! LOL BL12was talking to it and cleaning it off.
BL12 is a grade 5 (top grade) ewe so these are special lambs for me since these will be two of Lewis' last lambs. Twin ewes with good hair coats. So happy I decided to go into the barn and check. I love the big new barn in Yantis, but I will miss having my lambing barn only 30' feet from the back door. Easy to run out and check on ewes even during heavy rain. I will have to hook up a camera in the barn for lambing.

Got to shower and toss these jeans in the wash after kneeling in the pen.

 

[SageHill]

Huge congrats on the twins!! Super special twin ewes that is.
And —— WTG following your gut instinct.
My barn is 700’ away - a healthy walk. Got the blink cameras- not perfect but they work great for us.

 

[Baymule]

I’m so glad you got those 2 ewe lambs! WHOOP! They certainly are special! Great save! Your sheep are top notch quality, beautiful animals. You work hard and you deserve these Lewis daughters as a parting gift. The “old man” did good.