As most of you may remember, Jezebel and Jewel have been our escape artists this year, finding their way to their mothers so often after weaning that we had to "jail" them to keep them from finding the ewe flock and nursing. The last time we let them out was last Monday morning, and by afternoon, they had again found their way back to the flock of adult ewes.
Well, it has been one week since their last release and, according to my vet, ewes dry up their milk if they are not milked for a week, so we thought we would try letting them out of their pen again. It has actually been over two weeks since we weaned them, but now it has been a whole week since they've last been with their mothers. My normal routine is to fill the lambs' creep feeders in both the morning and early evening, so I thought I would open Jewel and Jezebel's pen after I filled the creep this morning. My thinking was that they would, hopefully, become so engrossed in the creep feed that they would forget about going to look for their mothers....
The plan seemed to be working when I opened up their "jail" this morning - as you can see in the photo at right, both Jewel and Jezebel headed straight for the nearest grain feeder and away from the door (behind me as I took the photo). As I went about my routine, I could peek in and see them filling up their tummies - a good sign!
Unfortunately, it didn't last long, though. When I finished my barn chores and took the dogs out for some exercise, I suddenly noticed two little lambs - one black and one white - making their way across one pasture after another, running full-speed for the adult ewe flock in the timber. It took only minutes, and by the time I got my camera out of my back pocket, they were just reaching the last fence, with llama Martin standing guard, ready to greet them! If you look closely at the photo on the left, you can see two little white dots (their coats) running towards Martin, who is just to the right of the big group of trees - they were already nearly a quarter-mile away!
Quite honestly, I'm not planning on fetching them back again - I am done with that game! Their mothers' milk is drying up, so I don't have to worry about having to wean them again. We will be weaning the last group of lambs this weekend, so we will move Jezebel and Jewel back with the lambs at that time - until then, they can graze with the ewe flock, I guess. When you work with livestock, sometimes you just have to call it good enough and move on - I think this is one of those times... but wait until this weekend! I'll get them back then!
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