Well this year our lady lambs did beautifully. After a few false starts and hubby stating that our new ram was a dud and not capable for getting the job done. The big Aussie white came through. The babies started arriving, some of our ladies even had two. Good job young fella. This is the story of finding Sam the Lamb.
Finding the Lamb
One day we got home and one mother had decided she couldn’t cope with her bub and had left her without food all day. The neighbour had rung saying she was baahing all day over against the side paddock fence. We didn’t get home until after dark. Cruising around on the quad bike with the headlights on proved fruitless. Walking we couldn’t hear her baahing or see her anywhere. Hubby and I started to call out over near the fence.
I was walking past a tree calling out ‘C’mon’ and she stood up and started baahing at me. We looked around for the mother bit found that she had been abandoned. Poor little thing it was probably likely that she had been along all day without any milk. Without a mother at a day old she would not have survived the night without our help. So hubby started calling. Miraculously she followed. He led her all the way home which was across three paddocks – pretty good stamina for a day old.

At Home
I found and cage we had purchased recently to take the puppy to the vet and lined it with newspaper and put in the foyer. I knew that she needed feeding as soon as possible. We have been in this situation before. I went hunting for the supplies that I would need. I found some left over lamb starter and some teets. Sterilising and using and old soft drink bottle I mixed up the lamb starter and attempted to bottle feed her. Pleas refer to this site for details on what to do with an abandoned lamb.
From my experience sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn’t. Sadly sometimes the lamb will take the bottle but becomes unwell with scours after a few days. Lucky for us and Sam, she took to the bottle straight away and drank her fill. The first night Sam stayed in the foyer so we could keep an eye on her.
We had became her surrogate parents. Looking down the barrel of 3 months of feeding a lamb 3 times per day – back to having a bottle fed bub!
Happy Ending
Sam made it through the night – thank goodness! The next day she was strong so we put her back out into the paddock with the other sheep. When it was time to feed her we would walk into the paddock and call her. It took a little while but after a few days she got the routine down pat. Every time you walked out the door and she saw you she would come baahing.
Sam is having a lovely time in the paddock with her sheep friends. She has lots of lambs to play with but still comes running when she sees with the bottle. If bottle bed lambs become so tame and will come up to you for the rest of their lives. That’s sheep farming!
Thank you for joining me on this adventure in raising lambs on our farm. I hope my stories entertain, and provide valuable insights into the wonderful world of farming. Stay tuned for more tales from the farm and the lambs continue to weave their woolly magic. Until next time, happy farming!
To find out how we got here check out my first blog post Welcome to Morgans Meadow!
What our Customers Say
See below some of the feedback from our customers.
Discover more from Morgans Meadow
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Too cute