Author: thesquirrel

I came in from work today to discover that Izzy, our oldest ewe, had just had her lamb. Now that the sheep have been shorn, the whole nursing theing has become much simpler. I picked up little wet lamb and moved her in to the second pre-made pen in the barn. Mom followed right along, and once they were closed in Izzy got down to cleaning off her baby.

By the time chores were done, little lamb was already nursing.  Our flock is now up to seven, with potentially one more on the way. Ewenice, our new Southdown ewe, also looks pretty pregnant.

Jennifer is off this week to Kimberton Hills in Pennsylvania for her permaculture teacher training. I came home Friday after work, when I went out to check on all the animals and do chores, there was Hermione the (formerly pregnant) ewe standing next to her baby lamb. Next to them, was Tom the ram, looking on benevolently. I moved mom and lamb in to the one of the lambing pens that Jennifer and I had set up.

Hermione is a year old Shetland sheep with a full on dreadlocky fuzzy Shetland wool coat, and the lamb was having a hard time finding its' way through all the hair to the udders. Lambs need their first shot of milk, called colostrum, within their first six hours. They need the energy and the immune boost that it gives them. Ironically the sheep shearer was scheduled to come the very next day. After shearing, the udder stands out like a giant pink bullseye on an almost white background. Before shearing, not so much. I had no idea how old the lamb was, and after watching for a while figured I needed to help out. I got the scissors and flipped Hermione over for a trim.

At this point I should mention that Jennifer has for the most part been the animal handler here. I'm the “hold this, pass those” guy, and happy to do so, as apparently I have used the opportunity to learn how to flip a sheep over.

After trimming the worst of her udder area, the lamb was still not figuring it out. I called Dr. Rob, and after explaining what was going on, he told me to go back to the barn and quietly watch for half an hour. If the lamb doesn't start nursing, he said he's come over and help.

It was a very long half hour. The lamb just sort of stood around leaning its' head on things. At the end I got in the pen and tried to help the lamb find the udder, but it wouldn't suckle. I dripped milk off of my finger and it sort of had the idea, but it still wouldn't nurse from its' mom.

I called Dr. Rob again. He suggested milking the mom, and bottle feeding the lamb to keep it going, and that he would pop by in a while to see how I was making out. Rob walked in just as I had the lamb drinking from the bottle. He hopped in the pen with me, checked mom & lamb out briefly, then showed me how get a lamb to nurse.

The trick is to hold the body near the mom with one hand, and to hold the head with the other. The lamb will instinctively head toward the top of mom's back leg where it joins the body, and move toward the udder from there, so position the lamb this way. Hold the lamb's head under the chin with your index and middle fingers. Use your thumb and ring finger to keep the lamb's mouth open, and move the teat in to the lamb's mouth with your index and middle finger. The lamb will figure it out and start to suckle. Make sure that the teat is not plugged first – there's a waxy plug that a lamb would normally remove on its' own, but in this case the lambs need all the help they can get.

Little lamb started suckling almost straight away. Whew. Rob held it in place until it seemed full. He had me hold the lamb and feel the belly. Much better. It was much bigger and rounder than before.

When I told Jennifer later on the phone, she told me that I helped a lamb in to the world, I'm now a shepherd. Now we need to come up with a name. I think I want to call him Friday. It relates to his arrival and presents endless opportunities for terrible puns. “Yay! Friday's here!”

The last blog post that I wrote was raving about Joel Salatin's book tour speech, and I think I promised a review of his book. It is an excellent book and “Folks, This Ain't Normal” really does describe his explanation of “conventional” industrial farming. He does an equally excellent job of explaining the Polyface mixed farm model, and why small mixed ecological farming is important.

Joel makes a very good point about the how the “producer to consumer relationship” distribution model works to promote safe production and handling of food. If I know you and know that you buy my eggs, I also know that you know exactly where the eggs come from if ever you have a problem. It's in my interest as a producer to provide you a safe product. Having said that, he takes the approach that “the Food Police” should be at very least not bothering small producers, and at very worst that food inspection should disappear, along with a lot of the industrial food system. Joel Salatin's food politics are strongly libertarian, but his perspective is from someone who's living the life that he extolls. While it's aimed at more of a general audience then his previous books, there's something for everyone in it.

Last Wednesday night the Brickworks played host to farmer and author Joel Salatin, who is on a tour to support his new book. By the time his reading got under way, he was playing to a pretty much packed house. Joel is a remarkable speaker, and there is a deep level of ecological understanding beneath his homey farmer exterior. In approximately ninety minutes, he gave a thumbnail history of agriculture, particularly managed grazing and its' role in an ecosystem.

All ecosystems, he pointed out, develop and progress with the aid and intervention of animals, particularly herbivores. These creatures process perennial plant biomass, and accumulate nutrients which they help cycle through the system. He gave the example of herbivores grazing a valley floor, and how their movement transports material to the top of the valley. This seasonal rotational grazing was, he pointed out, the mechanism that created the metres-deep topsoil that covered the great plains. Joel went on to draw a parallel between the microbial community in healthy soil and the microbial community that lives within each of our guts, and how this relationship ties us to our ecosystem.

He asserted that we have been using our intelligence and cleverness in an attempt to live outside the constraints of our ecosystem, and the “blip” of cheap energy that has made that possible is coming to an end. Against this bleak backdrop, he talked about ecosystem centered farming as a way of re-establishing a food system that operates within our ecological budget, and noted that an ecologically minded grass based farm system not only regenerated and improved the land, but that it restored a sense of the sacredness of nature.

All in all it was quite an evening. The question and answer session touched on a lot of issues relevant to Canadian farmers, and a spirited talk on supply management followed. Quota systems like the current poultry and dairy industry works within, create an economic barrier to entry for young entrepreneurial farmers, and create an equal “barrier to exit” for existing farmers who wish to retire. The Wheat Board, on the other hand, was more of a co-operative that ensured a fair selling price for all grain farmers regardless of size. He had a fair bit to say on the subject of “the food police,” particularly raw milk. He applauded the movement to link farmers directly to consumers, and sketched his ideal world, where educated consumers could buy directly from the farmer with no regulatory buffer in between. This, he claimed, would make farmers directly accountable to consumers, and would drive food safety.

Lots of conversation afterward revealed audience members felt a deep agreement with Joel's views on ecology, and less agreement with his admittedly libertarian politics.

I am devouring his book, and will post a review as soon as I have finished it.