Day: May 6, 2014

The cold winter is recent enough that I still feel the loss of color and light, now beginning to return to us. The pansies are the warriors of the Spring, they are the first ones out there.

In four days, Liam has gotten himself into more trouble than all of the lambs I  have known, and that is about 100 lambs. This afternoon, I went into the barn to check on him, and Suzy was agitated, running back and forth. Liam had stuck his head out into the space between the floor and the bottom of some wood planks – there was a small hole there – and he got stuck and couldn’t get back out. I had to squeeze and slide and wiggle his head out for a few minutes before I could free him.

His heart was beating rapidly again and his breathing has also intensified. He was exhausted. I hauled firewood and old hay bales into the barn to block the holes, the little monster is resting.

Four days ago, this lamb and ewe both nearly died during childbirth, I had to pull him out of the uterine canal and she went into shock. Today they are both out circling the pasture, they are both part of the community of animals here, you would never know there had been a problem. Life and death are cousins, they live side by one, one follows the other. There is no such thing as a no-kill farm.