Surrey Homes | SH41 | March 2018 | Fashion supplement inside

Jane Howard’s
Fables from
the Farm
The daffs are up and it can only mean one thing... lambs!
March already! Love it – the daffodils are out, the
birds are busy sorting out their territories (and
their love-lives) and here at Coopers it’s time to
start lambing.
Back in October we put the rams in with the ‘tegs’ (18
month old female sheep that are being mated for the
first time) a few weeks earlier than the main flock, in the
knowledge it will all start 147 days later, in the middle of
March. And every year we look forward to the prospect of so
much new life, completely forgetting the sleepless nights, the
tricky births and the inevitable sad losses.
Before it all begins there will be a visit to the agricultural
equivalent of Mothercare to stock up on birthing supplies.
Latex gloves (hygiene), colostrum powder (for the weaklings),
castration rings (pretty self explanatory), and bottles and
powdered milk for the unlucky third triplet (ewes only have
two teats so one unfortunate soul always gets left out).
Next step is to get the caravan ready. We used to take it in
turns to get out of bed in the farmhouse – a big deal when
you’re cosy and tucked up at 3am and it’s blowing a freezing
gale outside – to go down to the sheep shed to
check on progress. But then a couple of years
ago we had the idea to put an old caravan in
there with the girls, so all you have to do is tip
out for a quick look round without having to
endure the cold March winds outside.
In January we scanned all the ewes. Malcolm
the Scan Man runs a camera under their
stomachs - a process not unlike a human
pregnancy ultrasound scan – although of course the sheep are
not lying on their backs and Malcolm, unlike the midwife,
has a lot of wool to deal with.
We scan them so we see whether they are carrying singles,
twins or triplets and as they come through the scan machine
we are ready with the spray paint to put a splodge on their
“Before it all begins
there will be a visit
to the agricultural
equivalent of
Mothercare”
shoulder for a single, on the top of their tail for twins and a
stripe across the back for triplets.
Not only is this useful information at three in the morning
when you have to investigate a tricky birth which could
involve four legs or eight (or heaven forbid
twelve) but it also means we can feed
accordingly.
The last four weeks of pregnancy represent
the period of maximum growth for the lambs
and those ewes with multiple babes on board
need more food than those with singles. But
one of the biggest problems can arise with
the tegs that are carrying single lambs is that
if they eat too much in these last few weeks they can end up
producing a huge lamb that is devilish hard to get out.
Two or three days before the first lambs are expected, we
bring the ewes into the lambing shed where they will be quite
disgruntled, as they actively prefer to be outside, whatever the
weather.
They give birth in the large open-plan part of the shed
but once delivered we will move the new family units to
individual pens to ‘mother up’, the opportunity for the
mother and lambs to get to know each other’s bleats, baas and
smells so once back in the great outdoors they can find each
other if they get parted.
Before this happens they will all be given matching
numbers sprayed on the side of the ewes and the lambs, so if
two should get accidentally parted, you can wander around
the field carrying the lost no. 30 lamb seeking the matching
30 ewe and effect a happy reunion. Bring it on.
Follow Jane Howard – and the farm – on Instagram @coopersfarm
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