Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Plan for Uni Lambing 2012

We all had a think over the weekend, I asked everyone for dates they can and can't do and made a rota...

We need to cover 6 weeks worth of nights between the 4 of us, but Becky + Sian are going home after 2 weeks for Easter so that's down to Me + Cody.

The first 3 weeks will be busiest for the ewes with the majority of lambs born so will need 2 lambers each night. The plan is we'll do it in pairs between the 4 of us then for the 1st week of Easter I'll stay up for the week to lamb and bring my brother up!
Cody is doing the next week so I'll go home then I'm back to Aber.

Hopefully it'll work!

Friday, February 24, 2012

Uni lambing plans for 2012

Had to go up to the Uni farm earlier for a meeting with the head Shepherd.

They've lost 3 full-time staff (and got a new Farm Manager) since last year who covered lambing on the nights we couldn't do, did days and were there for us to call if there were any problems...
SO, because of that they want the 4 of us to cover all the Uni lambing, full-time nights for 6 weeks.

The 6 weeks start mid-March so goes over the Easter holidays.
Becky + Sian are going home for Easter and won't/can't come back up so its down to me + Cody.

Obviously we could say no and Uni will have to find some more staff to cover it but as much as I want to go home, I'd like to stay lambing too. The pay isn't a lot but does help but mainly do it for the experience, they may ask us to do more work in the future too.

We all need to sort out dates to decide if we can or can't do it, and come up with a rota of we can...

(Off to Reading for the weekend at a chicken show now!)

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Lambing; tired already!

Was tired + grumpy all day yesterday. Parked outside my house after lambing and got a parking ticket so wasn't a great start to the day.

Back lambing with Cody again tonight, tired but not too bad.
A couple hours in we had a prolapse ewe carrying Triplets so we had to ring the farmer to come and suture her up. Gave her antibiotics so hope she's alright!
Had quite a few triples born so we were adopting them onto singles so that both ewes end up with 2 lambs... to go with their 2 teats!

We started flagging at about 3am so was cup-a-soup o'clock then time goes quite quickly after that 'cos we have to bottle feed the lambs then feed + water the ewes.
Normally get a rush of ewes start lambing at 3 or 4 am as well so have to deal with them and get them penned off.

2012 Lamb count: 16 + 30 = 46

Monday, February 20, 2012

Started Lambing for 2012!

Started lambing at again for this year! :)
At the farm in New Cross for a few weeks and then we start at the Uni farm mid-March. Working 9pm 'til 6am and still have lecture but we'll be fine!
Is an Organic sheep farm with about 1,500 ewes so there should be double that in lambs!

My first triplet lambs of 2012!
Don't look v cute like that but they soon do as they dry off and clean up a bit.

Was there with Cody + Sian tonight but there's the same 4 of us that did last year and will be doing the nights between us.
We've got a new little terrier farm-dog with us this year called Smot. Jessie + Carlo are still there, Jacko has died since last year :(

Had a ewe down with Hypocalcaemia / Twin Lamb disease so injected 50ml of calcium under her skin and she improved a bit before we left.
Lamb count for tonight: 16