New Lambs and Whine about Rural Highways

We had an eventful day yesterday.  Just about the time we were leaving school last night, there was a terrible accident near our home - which meant that we were stuck in the car on the road for 2 hours.  There are no alternative routes to my house, just the highway, so when they close it, we're stuck.  This has happened before when a pole fell down due to soft ground from tons of rain.  This time it was a fatal accident. 

At just about the same time as the accident, my husband was searching our pasture for Audrey who didn't come in with the other sheep.  Sure enough, she'd had her lambs back there and decided not to come in.  It's a pain (as all of you who have had to carry lambs at ewe nose height know) to get them in...why ewes can't look up to see lambs is a mystery. 

I love that Audrey is such a good mama.  By the time I did get home (at 8 pm - over 2 hours after I left work), she'd settled in with them.  They were strong, nursing well, and all I had to do was dip those umbilical cords and make sure she got some extra feed and water with electrolytes.  They are two unrelievedly black ram lambs - a bummer on both the color and the gender - I would have loved two more ewes.  

Speaking of ram lambs, I checked my records, and I didn't make a mistake on the two ram lambs from spring.  I didn't castrate Buddy because I thought he was going to die (he's the one that got sick) and I did castrate Koa - he's still castrated, but he has some other sort of swelling on his abdomen.  I wonder if he is cryptorchid - but he doesn't seem to be in pain and he's growing well. I just have to make sure I do a good job with these two.

Today is a treat.  The weather, so far, is lovely, and NO ONE has practice!  I am going home to ride after work and looking forward to it mightily.  I will have to work through lunch to get the stuff done that I promised myself to do in order to do so, but it will be worth it.  I can ride, check out the lambs with light other than the tack room light and a small flashlight, and make a proper dinner.