Blackie Gives Birth to Twin Lambs that Look Like Calves

A few days ago Girlie gave birth to triplets. The next two days it snowed and we were quite concerned as we knew Diamond and Blackie were also due.

Normally it is best if sheep lamb in the spring, or at least later in the winter, but this spring we had an incident and did not quite get rid of our ram when we should have and he happened to breed three of the ewes while they still had their lambs with them from this past spring. We were not aware of this until a few weeks ago when it was quite clear that three ewes were getting udders.  Diamond was the largest.

On Monday, October 8, Canadian Thanksgiving, one of these ewes, Girlie, had triplets. The next couple of days were bad as the weather turned nasty and we even got snow. Today it rained. I was at work when half way through the day my daughter called to say that Blackie sheep (who had been a bottle baby lamb a few years earlier) had twins.  

My daughter said that one was a male (ram lamb) and one was female (ewe lamb) and that they were spotted and looked like cows.  The male has wooly hair and the female has more silky hair.  The female has more white than the male. 

My daughter said she knew there were some lambs because she could see Crystal, the llama, standing near the old barn with her head trying to poke into the barn. Crystal loves lambs, whenever there are new lambs she wants to get near and smell them. My daughter picked up the two lambs and carried them to the proper barn (where Girlie and her triplets have been kept indoors because her triplets are tiny and the weather is cold), Blackie followed well, which is good, sometimes the ewes panic and run around looking for the lambs.

When I got home from work I saw them, my husband tried to get some good pictures but the lambs were a little nervous. They are four days younger these two new lambs are larger than the triplets. 

Click here for a different picture of the lambs.

Sheep Trivia

Sheep Weight Loss Program?

All of my sheep have had their lambs for 2012, Mrs Dark Brown Barbado was the last.  She had triplets last year, and was huge, so I was expecting a set of three lambs.  Here she is only a few days ago, I thought for sure she was going to lamb that day, if not.. that hour!

Her udder was also huge, but sneaking up behind her to take a picture was a but more difficult.

As you can see in this picture, Mrs Dark Brown Barbado is huge.  She is also a hair sheep if you are puzzled by her unusual look.  Her breed is Barbado, or at least that is the name they have in my area, in other areas they are called American Blackbelly, the rams have large curled horns.  These sheep do not need shearing, and shed like dogs.

A few days after taking her photo she had lambs, twin boys.

The father of the lambs is a Katahdin Dorper, also a hair sheep.  He is mostly white wtih only a black head and black saddle, but amazingly a large number of his lambs have been mostly black, with white, like this cute pair.

Some people are not familiar with Barbado sheep and often say they are wild, and prone to be mean, but we have never found this.  Even when we did have Barbado rams (they have huge horns) they were never mean.  The ewes were never more nervous than any of our other ewes, and this ewe in particular is very friendly.  As such if you are interested in getting Barbado sheep and have heard that they are crazy, disregard it.  When handled with kindness they respond.  I can approach this ewe in the pasture and pat her as though she were a dog.