Babies!

What a difference a day makes! When I had the girls up on the stand yesterday morning I thought that no one was imminent as far as kidding. While udders were filling and firming up, teats were still empty. When I fed late in the afternoon, they all attacked the hay I offered with gusto. When I went out to check before going to bed (about 11:15), Myrtle did not meet me at the fence like normal. She had commandeered one side of the barn, and had new companions:

 Yep, triplets! All boys (not that it will make any difference in the long run). Myrtle is an attentive mother, and all  were in the process of being cleaned off. I made sure that both teats were functional and discovered that her colostrum was so thick that there was no way the kids could access it on their own. It was almost solid! Several trips back and forth between the barn and house and I had thinned out some to tube feed all of them to make sure they got a decent start in the world. I checked on them again before finally getting to bed at 3 am.

Sticking with my “O”  naming theme for the year, we have Othello (the black one), Odin (the one laying down, who is the largest and is having some issues controlling his back legs), and Obi Wan (the little one hiding by mom; he is little but the Force is strong within him). Pictures were taken this morning, and it has taken all my self-control to not spend the entire day out in the barn cuddling them. Obi Wan went for a walk on his own outside the barn this afternoon but I have moved things around so that can’t happen again. I will keep them in the barn until they have all mastered their legs. Everyone is very interested in the little guys, but Myrtle is brooking no nonsense from the crowd at her door. I can already see an improvement in Odin’s leg control, so I’m thinking by tomorrow or Saturday they should all be bouncing off the walls and ready for the freedom of the pen. I did give him some BoSe, just to be sure.  They are all nursing well, and her milk has already thinned to a much more liquid consistency.

Clara and Cloe are both very interested in the babies. In fact, Clara was willing to help clean them off last night and I ended up having to shut up the barn all the way to keep her from attempting to climb over into their stall. I don’t think that either of them will be too far behind with kids of their own. They still got some time up on the milk stand this morning, just to get into the routine better, and I used the time to do some hoof trimming. It was very interesting to me that even though they have both had their feet trimmed before I have not had to do anything to Myrtles feet. They both jumped right up on the stand to have their little handful of grain/hay pellets, and were a bit better about going back in the pen afterwards. Even better, the sheep ignored our little adventure for the most part (unlike yesterday, when the consensus seemed to be that leaving them behind was a clerical error on my part).