So, it is finally over, all of my animal handling exams. Yesterday I had sheep and cattle. We got to the sheep shed and I had an 11.10am - 11.20am exam time. I waited around and did some last minute studying, like remembering estrus cycles of sheep and gestation periods, etc. The lambing stuff was easy since I had just spent 3 weeks lambing. I was called in and I had the shepard Archie, examine me. He started out by asking me to describe what breed the sheep were (Scottish Mules, Blackface crossed with a Bluefaced Leicester). I went a little extra by describing why the two are crossed. He then asked me to restrain one and age it. These sheep were extremely easy to catch and just stood there while I caught them. I aged the first one wrong thinking that it was an older ewe because the teeth were small, thin and spaced apart. In being nervous, I forgot to compare body size against age as well. Apparently all the teeth were milk teeth and the ewe was just over a year. He had me age another one and I got that correct since there were 2 sets of adult incisors. He then had me catch a lamb and give the sex of the lamb. He then had me discuss ear tagging requirements, what is important in the first 24 hours of lambing time, hygiene at lambing time, problems at lambing time with the ewes, etc. At the end, I had to identify types of feeds, which I aced, and then identify sheep breeds which I did okay on. Afterwards, we went back to the university cafeteria and ate lunch and had to be back at the sheep shed to catch the bus for 12.30pm.
The bus came and took us to Langhill Farm, where I had a 2.40pm exam time. I changed into my waterproofs and made my way to the teaching shed where the exams were being held. Lawrence, the farmer, came out and got me. The person that was examining me was Wilson. I was extremely happy because I had done a week of dairy with him last July and he was at the revision session last Friday, so he had seen that I could do everything at the revision session already. The exam was very straight forward. I had to show how to put in a mouth gag, discuss stomach tubing, discuss lactation information, identify breeds and then I was done. I washed off and took the bus home and was so tired that I didn't even bother studying for dog/cat. I felt that since I have been working with them for almost 6 years, that I should be fine.
I woke up today around 7.30am and caught the 8.40am bus to the dog/cat shelter. There were 5 of us that met at the bus. We got to the shelter and I still had a couple of hours, so I decided to sit by the beach. It was extremely nice out, but a little windy. We all went into the waiting room and I waited until it was time for me to go in. I studied some cat breeds/colors since I wasn't too great with that and went over a couple dog breeds that I wasn't sure of (Afghan, Bedlington Terrier). I was called out and I made my way to my examiner. She started out by pulling out a pile of dog pictures and asked me to identify about 10-12 of the breeds. I named all but one, and I couldn't remember for the life of me. I said sheepdog. She then told me to give the full correct name. I was quiet for a second and then said English Sheepdog and left it at that. I forgot the "OLD" but was close enough. Old English Sheepdog, very hairy dogs!
I finished with the identification and we then went into the dog pens. The examiner gave me a lead rope and told me to get this springer spaniel out of the cage. Of course, I get an extremely hyper dog for my handling exam... I took the dog out and brought it into the exam room. I had to describe the dog and the coat color, pick it up and put it on the table, give the sex of the dog, administer a pill down the throat, apply muzzle tape, put into lateral recumbency, put dog back on ground and back into the kennel. I then followed the examiner outside and had to describe two cats that were outside. I got one, but the second one was a bit tricky, so not sure how I did on that. I'm confident I did good on the handling aspect and the dog breed identification, but the cats not so sure on. I was quite happy afterwards. I am now finished with the handling exams and now have to study for the exam on Friday, the big written exam. Hopefully it won't be too difficult. Well, hope everyone is doing great and I shall talk to you all soon!
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Monday, April 26, 2010
Day 1 of handling exams OVER!
So, one day down, 3 to go! Today was our first set of handling exams. I had Exotics and Equine today and I was really worried about the exotics portion of the handling exam. Each exam was only 10 minutes long, which isn't bad at all. We took the noon bus out to the veterinary school and waited a couple of hours until it was my turn for the exotics. Every person had a separate time and there were two that went in at a time at two different stations. I went in and was placed at station A, the reptile station. The lady took me into the reptile area and asked me what kind of snake was in the the vivarium. I told her a corn snake (which was correct), she then preceded to ask me where it was from. I guessed and said a desert snake, she said no and gave me another chance. I said, India? Nope, somewhere in the US. Horrible! I mean, come on! I felt like I was back in Herpetology trying to figure out where a species of a snake is from. She asked me how I would approach the snake and I told her, and had to describe to her what I was doing as I was picking up the snake. I got the snake out and we brought it out to the table, where she asked me more questions about the snake. She asked me about skin shedding, behavior and when to know when the snake is agitated, housing requirements for the snake, etc. She then put two bags of food in front of me and asked me what they were. I started out by saying the one on the left is a bird feed and she looked at me puzzled. I took a second look and saw that there were no seeds in the mix. I then said it was rodent mix (which was correct) and then she asked me what the food was on the right. This was a tricky one and I honestly had no idea. The food looked like thin, elongated pellets that were dark brown in color. The only thing that came to mind was Chinchilla Pellets. So that's what I told her. She said I was correct and then asked how I knew they were chinchilla pellets. Ok, like I'm going to know that? Apparently they are elongated so that the chinchilla has an easier time of grasping the food. I put the snake back and washed my hands and was finished. Hopefully I passed that exam, seemed like I did okay with it. Next was horses, which I have to say was SOOOOO easy! It was nice that they were using the teaching mares. I barely had to do anything when it came to lifting the mare's leg, she did it for me. I had to properly put on a head collar, walk with the horse, trot with the horse, tie the horse up, lift legs, lead it back into the stable, answer some questions about the condition of the stable and finally answer a question about which rug I would use on a horse if putting it outside. Now, this one was extremely easy. There were two choices, there was one rug, which was extremely muddy and dirty all over and there was a second rug, which was perfectly clean. Now, which one did I pick? Of course I picked the clean one...Just kidding, the one on the left obviously was an outdoor rug. So, finished with those two and now I have sheep and cattle tomorrow. Hopefully sheep won't be too bad and cattle won't be either. Well, back to studying! Talk to you all later!
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Third Update From North Yorkshire...
April 12th:
So today was quite exciting. I'll just jump straight to the interesting part because the beginning of the day was quite uneventful. At around 12.20am, Tessie the Texel/Border Leicester cross was going into labor. Ellie told me about Tessie when I first got here and said that Tessie was all m;uscle because of the Texel in her. Ellie had said that I may have to rugby tackle Tessie when she delivers her lamb(s) because she will run the entire time. Well, I didn't have to do that, but she was still not a good ewe to deal with. I went out and saw that the water bag had come out and was hanging there. I made sure there was no head inside the bag, otherwise I would of had to have broken the bag. I went in for 15 minutes and we then saw half of a lamb sticking out of Tessie on the sheep camera in the caravan! I quickly ran out just in time to see that Tessie was bashing the lamb's head against the hay rack in an attempt to try and get the lamb out herself! I jumped over the railing and quickly pulled the lamb out the rest of the way. Once the lamb was out, Tessie bonded very well. Talk about a rude awakening for the lamb. "Welcome to the world, watch your head on the way out!".
April 13th:
No more ewes lambed during the night. We woke up around 9am. I looked out my window and saw that there was a very thick fog hanging about. It was gone within a couple of hours. Was very cold and wet today. Ellie and I mostly stayed in and worked on my EMS reports that I have to do along with this placement. Around 4pm, we noticed that there was a ewe going into labor. We looked and saw that the water bag had broken and there was a foot and nose sticking out. I gave it 20 minutes of watching the ewe push and strain with no indications that the lamb would be coming out anytime soon. I was by myself because Ellie was feeding. I was worried that the ewe would stand up as I put my hand in so I was partially sitting on her so she couldn't get up. As soon as I inserted my hand, she really started pushing and at that point I knew she wouldn't be getting up anytime soon. I worked the lamb out and it was very tight. The head was trapped so I had to really work around the head and push down on it to get it out. I finally managed to pull the lamb out. It was a big girl and the ewe bonded with her very well.
April 14th:
Today, Ellie left around 8am and left me to take care of everything for about 8 hours. She went up to Berwick, Scotland to pick up about 19 replacement ewes that she lent to this farmer. I fed everyone, which took forever by myself. I worked on some notes for my exam and Ellie showed up around 6pm. I noticed that one of the ewes was on the ground and beginning to push. I saw no water bag but it was quite wet on the wool around the vulva, so the bag must have broken. About 5 minutes later I saw the tip of a foot. I waited about 15 minutes and decided to go in to assist. Peter, Ellie's friend was here. He had driven up to Berwick with Ellie to help with the sheep. He went in to hold the ewe that was in labor down. I went to go wash my hands and when I got back in the shed, Peter had his dirty hands in and was feeling for the lamb. This poor ewe! Peter is quite a big man and each finger is like a bratwurst sausage! PLUS, he hadn't washed his hands! So he took his hand out and I put a lot of lubricant around my hand. I went in and felt both front legs and made sure that they weren't back legs. I found the head and attempted to work out the lamb. It was such a tight fit and it seemed like it was taking forever! The lamb started moving inside as well and every time I would go in and grab a leg, the lamb would pull it back. I finally pulled hard enough and managed to get both front legs out but the head was still inside. Peter pushed down up by the anus where the head was and we managed to get the lamb out finally. I stuck some straw up the lambs nose to cause a sneeze reflex so that it would start breathing and massaged its chest a bit. It was quite a big lamb as well. Afterwards, we let mum bond with her new lamb and we went out to give dewormer to all the ewes Ellie had just picked up. Peter left and we fed all the animals. Jerome was supposed to relieve us but he never called and was not answering his phone. Ellie and I decided that around 7pm, we would go get Chinese takeaway and come back to the caravan. We got back, ate dinner, watched the tele (guess what we watched? ...CSI!!!). We then went to bed.
April 15th:
Today was very uneventful. Fed the animals in the morning, sat in the caravan all day and watched movies and worked on studying a bit.
April 16th:
Today a young girl (14 or 15) came to the farm to get some experience before she applies to vet school. She was extremely quiet and it was difficult to get her to talk. I showed her around a bit and educated her about what to do around lambing time. We had nothing until about 3pm when one of the ewes began to bleat quite loudly. I knew that she was going to pass a lamb within the hour. She kept lying down, pushing and then getting back up. She did this for about 20 minutes and the lamb's leg kept going in and out with no indications that she was going to pass the lamb on her own since she was straining so hard. I got both legs out but wasn't able to get the head out. I pushed one of the legs back in to make more room and managed to get the head out and then grabbed the other leg. I pulled the lamb out and it was quite large. We took care of the lamb and Jerome came to relieve us later. We went to Ellie's, where I had a great shower! We then got Chinese takeaway that was awesome! We headed back to the farm and one of the ewes had lambed while we were away. The ewe that had lambed was a very sweet ewe that was named Raquelle. She had two lambs that were smaller than what we had been seeing. We tried feeding them and one wasn't quite sure what to do with her tongue. It just flopped out to the side. We finally managed to get a bit of colostrum down the lamb and called it a night. I went out to the shed one last time and told all the ewes that there is to be no lambing until after 9am tomorrow morning, at least that was my wish.
April 17th:
My wish of no ewes waking me up early did not come true...At 4.45am, a ewe was pushing and I could heaer it from my window that I had cracked open because Ellie had the heater on so high. I went out and had no idea how long she had been pushing and two legs were out. It looked like she was straining quite hard so I decided to assist her. I managed to get the lamb out and it was ok. I fed it some colostrum and went back for a quick half hour nap and got up around 7.30am and got ready. Kristen's train was arriving at Darlington station for 10am. We went to Ellie's house before we went to the station so I could take a shower, and oh did it feel good to take a shower! I had a cup of tea before we left and went to go grab my jacket. However, in the rush of things, back at the caravan before leaving for Ellie's, I forgot to grab my jacket. Ellie was so kind as to let me borrow a fleece, a woman's fleece... It was dark blue and fit somewhat. If it was going to be cold in Whitby, I was going to need something. We got to Darlington at 10.15am and when we pulled up, all I could say was wow! I immediately saw Kristen and she was so gorgeous! We got her in the car and had to hurry to make the 10.38am train in Middlesburgh. Ellie dropped us off at what she thought was the rail entrance, but it wasn't. Kristen and I managed to miss the train but decided to hang out in Middlesburgh until the next train came, which was at 2.15pm. Middlesburgh was nice, but not a huge amount of stuff to do other than shopping. We got on the train to Whitby and wow was it beautiful! The scenery was great with a lot of tiny farms and fields full of ewes and new lambs. We arrived in Whitby and it was absolutely beautiful outside with the sun out and clear skies. The town was so busy but was absolutely stunning! We immediately fell in love with the town. There is a port that runs through town and there were loads of boat tours that you could take. We wanted to find accommodation as soon as we could, however, because there were so many tourists because of it being Military weekend, a lot of places had no vacancies. I had my iphone out and was calling hotel after hotel. Every person I spoke with had the same answer, "sorry, we are booked for the night." I walked into this pub/inn while Kristen waited outside. No vacancies either but the lady there pointed me towards some bed and breakfasts that would have accommodation available. As we walked along the port, the smell of fresh fish was pungent in the air. We walked by a couple of fresh fish bars and Kristen happened to notice a sign in the window of a pub called "BUCK INN" that was flashing the word, "vacancies". I thought that maybe they had forgotten to light up the "no" before the word. We walked in and it was a bar with 3 rooms upstairs. There was one room left so we took it and dropped all of our stuff off in the room. The room was very nice and cozy. We headed out to check out the town. We decided to go to the end of the pier towards the lighthouse. When we reached the pier, all I can say is wow!!! Words could not describe what I saw and pictures will surely not do justice as to how beautiful it was. There were huge cliffs lining the coast, a massive beach following the coast, a view of an 800 year old abbey on a cliff overlooking the town and a beautiful view of the ocean. We took loads of pictures and went up the lighthouse. It cost 1.20 per person to go up, but was worth it. The spiral staircase was so old and once at the top, the view was amazing! Don't worry because between her and I, we have loads of pictures that I will be uploading. We were hungry afterwards so we headed to the world famous "Magpie Fish and Chips". It was sooooo good. Was not greasy like most fish and chip shops. The cod was very good, almost melted in our mouths. We sat down overlooking the pier on a little bench and it was so nice. We walked around the town to check out all the shops, and the streets were so busy! The streets that that shops were on were very narrow too and had old cobblestone covering the streets. We had decided to go to Whitby Abbey and see the whalebone arch on Sunday and explore the town instead. We explored more and went back to our inn we were staying at. We changed and got ready to go out for drinks. We walked around for a while before finding a pub. We came across this weird shop that had these little bear figures. It was a collection called "Bad Bear", and the things they were doing were weird. There was one that had been bitten by a shark and was dressed in surfer gear holding a surf board. However, coming out of the bite wound were it's intestines. Very strange I tell ya! There were others, but I definitely will not go into detail regarding those. We finally came across a small pub called the "Golden Lion". It was very small inside but was a nice old pub. There were a bunch of French guys in the other room chanting "aluvetta....", not sure if I spelled it correctly. We had a drink and took pictures of our nerdy chics. Before Kristen left for home for Easter, she gave me an Easter bag full of things. She had put in two nerdy chics that were wearing glasses and a yellow ribbon each. We decided that from now on, wherever we go for trips, we are to bring the chics and take pictures of them together. Kind of like the travelocity gnome, but better...MUCH better! We went to another pub and called it a night.
April 18th:
We woke up around 7.30am to get the day started early since Ellie was coming at 3pm to pick us up. We decided to grab a bite to eat. We each had a full English breakfast, which did a great job at satisfying our bellies. Afterwards, we headed back to the inn to see what time checkout was. The lady let us keep our bags in our room until 3pm since no one was there during the day. We headed towards the hill that had the whalebone arch. The lower whale jawbones were from Anchorage, Alaska. While we were up on the hill, we noticed that there was a military show going on. There were some tents with a bunch of war memorabilia and the men were dressed in uniform. There was even an American tent at the very end! Afterwards, we walked to the abbey where we ascended 200 steps to reach it. There was a graveyard where Bram Stoker's story of Dracula was written. There is such an amazing history here it's amazing! We walked around the abbey a bit and took LOADS of pictures! We walked to the graveyard and took some pictures. The view of the eastern coastline was absolutely gorgeous. It was a very picturesque view and I could hardly believe my eyes at how beautiful it was. We descended the steps and headed back into town where we decided to grab lunch at a cafe. We sat upstairs where we had a view of the harbor and the abbey on the hill in the distance. While eating, Ellie had called and said she could not pick us up because a ewe started lambing. She was supposed to pick us up because no trains run out of Whitby on a Sunday. Kristen and I had to rush to the bus station. We managed to get to a bus right as it was leaving. We met Ellie in Guisborough where she picked us up. Ted and Archie (Ellie's dogs) were also in the truck with us along with Ted's littermate Bruno. They really liked Kristen and huddled up next to her in the front seat. I'll have to admit, I was a little jealous of those dogs. Here I was sitting in the back seat alone and Ted and Bruno were hanging out with Kristen in the front seat. That's ok though, Archie hung out with me in the back seat. We headed back to the farm. I showed Kristen around and she helped me feed all the ewes. Ellie warmed up some milk and I showed Kristen how to bottle-feed a lamb. She fed the lamb that we suspect has a selenium deficiency, which causes White Muscle Disease. Basically, the lamb is too weak to get up right now. He should get better after a couple administrations of seleium. Kristen managed to get 100mls of milk down the lamb, which was great! Better than what I had gotten down him the first time. Jeoff was there helping Ellie and he left the gate that divided the ewes from the tups. We had to go and get the four ewes straight away. Afterwards, we headed out for a very quick dinner at this really good Chinese restaurant. We literally had like 15 minutes for Kristen to eat. Ellie had the lady that worked there hire a taxi for Kristen. I helped her out to the taxi and Ellie and I finished dinner. We went back to the farm and there had been no lambs. We called it a night and headed off to bed.
April 19th:
Today, there was no action at the farm. I fed the animals and watched some tele. We had dinner later on and went to bed early. The ewes were nice and did not lamb at all through the night.
April 20th:
Well, today is my last day. We woke up around 9am and fed all the sheep. My train was at 12.46pm (so I thought). We went to Ellie's daughter's house for a cup of tea. Her daughter has this enormous estate! The front drive was huge but the backyard was HUGE!!!!!! It even had it's own forest with thickets of trees all over! There was a little pagoda in the middle of a small pond that was lovely. I walked around with the dogs. After I walked around a bit, we left and headed back so I could get ready. Ellie's friend Heather and her husband picked me up and drove me to Darlington station. I got there and had missed the train. I had thought originally that the train was at 12.46pm when in reality, it was at 12.26pm. Oh well, I had to purchase another ticket and wait another half hour before the next train arrived. I got home to Edinburgh and was so relieved to be back in my flat. I went grocery shopping and had Kristen over for dinner.
PICTURES: So, I am now going to work on uploading photos for you all. Check the link at the top on the right.
So today was quite exciting. I'll just jump straight to the interesting part because the beginning of the day was quite uneventful. At around 12.20am, Tessie the Texel/Border Leicester cross was going into labor. Ellie told me about Tessie when I first got here and said that Tessie was all m;uscle because of the Texel in her. Ellie had said that I may have to rugby tackle Tessie when she delivers her lamb(s) because she will run the entire time. Well, I didn't have to do that, but she was still not a good ewe to deal with. I went out and saw that the water bag had come out and was hanging there. I made sure there was no head inside the bag, otherwise I would of had to have broken the bag. I went in for 15 minutes and we then saw half of a lamb sticking out of Tessie on the sheep camera in the caravan! I quickly ran out just in time to see that Tessie was bashing the lamb's head against the hay rack in an attempt to try and get the lamb out herself! I jumped over the railing and quickly pulled the lamb out the rest of the way. Once the lamb was out, Tessie bonded very well. Talk about a rude awakening for the lamb. "Welcome to the world, watch your head on the way out!".
April 13th:
No more ewes lambed during the night. We woke up around 9am. I looked out my window and saw that there was a very thick fog hanging about. It was gone within a couple of hours. Was very cold and wet today. Ellie and I mostly stayed in and worked on my EMS reports that I have to do along with this placement. Around 4pm, we noticed that there was a ewe going into labor. We looked and saw that the water bag had broken and there was a foot and nose sticking out. I gave it 20 minutes of watching the ewe push and strain with no indications that the lamb would be coming out anytime soon. I was by myself because Ellie was feeding. I was worried that the ewe would stand up as I put my hand in so I was partially sitting on her so she couldn't get up. As soon as I inserted my hand, she really started pushing and at that point I knew she wouldn't be getting up anytime soon. I worked the lamb out and it was very tight. The head was trapped so I had to really work around the head and push down on it to get it out. I finally managed to pull the lamb out. It was a big girl and the ewe bonded with her very well.
April 14th:
Today, Ellie left around 8am and left me to take care of everything for about 8 hours. She went up to Berwick, Scotland to pick up about 19 replacement ewes that she lent to this farmer. I fed everyone, which took forever by myself. I worked on some notes for my exam and Ellie showed up around 6pm. I noticed that one of the ewes was on the ground and beginning to push. I saw no water bag but it was quite wet on the wool around the vulva, so the bag must have broken. About 5 minutes later I saw the tip of a foot. I waited about 15 minutes and decided to go in to assist. Peter, Ellie's friend was here. He had driven up to Berwick with Ellie to help with the sheep. He went in to hold the ewe that was in labor down. I went to go wash my hands and when I got back in the shed, Peter had his dirty hands in and was feeling for the lamb. This poor ewe! Peter is quite a big man and each finger is like a bratwurst sausage! PLUS, he hadn't washed his hands! So he took his hand out and I put a lot of lubricant around my hand. I went in and felt both front legs and made sure that they weren't back legs. I found the head and attempted to work out the lamb. It was such a tight fit and it seemed like it was taking forever! The lamb started moving inside as well and every time I would go in and grab a leg, the lamb would pull it back. I finally pulled hard enough and managed to get both front legs out but the head was still inside. Peter pushed down up by the anus where the head was and we managed to get the lamb out finally. I stuck some straw up the lambs nose to cause a sneeze reflex so that it would start breathing and massaged its chest a bit. It was quite a big lamb as well. Afterwards, we let mum bond with her new lamb and we went out to give dewormer to all the ewes Ellie had just picked up. Peter left and we fed all the animals. Jerome was supposed to relieve us but he never called and was not answering his phone. Ellie and I decided that around 7pm, we would go get Chinese takeaway and come back to the caravan. We got back, ate dinner, watched the tele (guess what we watched? ...CSI!!!). We then went to bed.
April 15th:
Today was very uneventful. Fed the animals in the morning, sat in the caravan all day and watched movies and worked on studying a bit.
April 16th:
Today a young girl (14 or 15) came to the farm to get some experience before she applies to vet school. She was extremely quiet and it was difficult to get her to talk. I showed her around a bit and educated her about what to do around lambing time. We had nothing until about 3pm when one of the ewes began to bleat quite loudly. I knew that she was going to pass a lamb within the hour. She kept lying down, pushing and then getting back up. She did this for about 20 minutes and the lamb's leg kept going in and out with no indications that she was going to pass the lamb on her own since she was straining so hard. I got both legs out but wasn't able to get the head out. I pushed one of the legs back in to make more room and managed to get the head out and then grabbed the other leg. I pulled the lamb out and it was quite large. We took care of the lamb and Jerome came to relieve us later. We went to Ellie's, where I had a great shower! We then got Chinese takeaway that was awesome! We headed back to the farm and one of the ewes had lambed while we were away. The ewe that had lambed was a very sweet ewe that was named Raquelle. She had two lambs that were smaller than what we had been seeing. We tried feeding them and one wasn't quite sure what to do with her tongue. It just flopped out to the side. We finally managed to get a bit of colostrum down the lamb and called it a night. I went out to the shed one last time and told all the ewes that there is to be no lambing until after 9am tomorrow morning, at least that was my wish.
April 17th:
My wish of no ewes waking me up early did not come true...At 4.45am, a ewe was pushing and I could heaer it from my window that I had cracked open because Ellie had the heater on so high. I went out and had no idea how long she had been pushing and two legs were out. It looked like she was straining quite hard so I decided to assist her. I managed to get the lamb out and it was ok. I fed it some colostrum and went back for a quick half hour nap and got up around 7.30am and got ready. Kristen's train was arriving at Darlington station for 10am. We went to Ellie's house before we went to the station so I could take a shower, and oh did it feel good to take a shower! I had a cup of tea before we left and went to go grab my jacket. However, in the rush of things, back at the caravan before leaving for Ellie's, I forgot to grab my jacket. Ellie was so kind as to let me borrow a fleece, a woman's fleece... It was dark blue and fit somewhat. If it was going to be cold in Whitby, I was going to need something. We got to Darlington at 10.15am and when we pulled up, all I could say was wow! I immediately saw Kristen and she was so gorgeous! We got her in the car and had to hurry to make the 10.38am train in Middlesburgh. Ellie dropped us off at what she thought was the rail entrance, but it wasn't. Kristen and I managed to miss the train but decided to hang out in Middlesburgh until the next train came, which was at 2.15pm. Middlesburgh was nice, but not a huge amount of stuff to do other than shopping. We got on the train to Whitby and wow was it beautiful! The scenery was great with a lot of tiny farms and fields full of ewes and new lambs. We arrived in Whitby and it was absolutely beautiful outside with the sun out and clear skies. The town was so busy but was absolutely stunning! We immediately fell in love with the town. There is a port that runs through town and there were loads of boat tours that you could take. We wanted to find accommodation as soon as we could, however, because there were so many tourists because of it being Military weekend, a lot of places had no vacancies. I had my iphone out and was calling hotel after hotel. Every person I spoke with had the same answer, "sorry, we are booked for the night." I walked into this pub/inn while Kristen waited outside. No vacancies either but the lady there pointed me towards some bed and breakfasts that would have accommodation available. As we walked along the port, the smell of fresh fish was pungent in the air. We walked by a couple of fresh fish bars and Kristen happened to notice a sign in the window of a pub called "BUCK INN" that was flashing the word, "vacancies". I thought that maybe they had forgotten to light up the "no" before the word. We walked in and it was a bar with 3 rooms upstairs. There was one room left so we took it and dropped all of our stuff off in the room. The room was very nice and cozy. We headed out to check out the town. We decided to go to the end of the pier towards the lighthouse. When we reached the pier, all I can say is wow!!! Words could not describe what I saw and pictures will surely not do justice as to how beautiful it was. There were huge cliffs lining the coast, a massive beach following the coast, a view of an 800 year old abbey on a cliff overlooking the town and a beautiful view of the ocean. We took loads of pictures and went up the lighthouse. It cost 1.20 per person to go up, but was worth it. The spiral staircase was so old and once at the top, the view was amazing! Don't worry because between her and I, we have loads of pictures that I will be uploading. We were hungry afterwards so we headed to the world famous "Magpie Fish and Chips". It was sooooo good. Was not greasy like most fish and chip shops. The cod was very good, almost melted in our mouths. We sat down overlooking the pier on a little bench and it was so nice. We walked around the town to check out all the shops, and the streets were so busy! The streets that that shops were on were very narrow too and had old cobblestone covering the streets. We had decided to go to Whitby Abbey and see the whalebone arch on Sunday and explore the town instead. We explored more and went back to our inn we were staying at. We changed and got ready to go out for drinks. We walked around for a while before finding a pub. We came across this weird shop that had these little bear figures. It was a collection called "Bad Bear", and the things they were doing were weird. There was one that had been bitten by a shark and was dressed in surfer gear holding a surf board. However, coming out of the bite wound were it's intestines. Very strange I tell ya! There were others, but I definitely will not go into detail regarding those. We finally came across a small pub called the "Golden Lion". It was very small inside but was a nice old pub. There were a bunch of French guys in the other room chanting "aluvetta....", not sure if I spelled it correctly. We had a drink and took pictures of our nerdy chics. Before Kristen left for home for Easter, she gave me an Easter bag full of things. She had put in two nerdy chics that were wearing glasses and a yellow ribbon each. We decided that from now on, wherever we go for trips, we are to bring the chics and take pictures of them together. Kind of like the travelocity gnome, but better...MUCH better! We went to another pub and called it a night.
April 18th:
We woke up around 7.30am to get the day started early since Ellie was coming at 3pm to pick us up. We decided to grab a bite to eat. We each had a full English breakfast, which did a great job at satisfying our bellies. Afterwards, we headed back to the inn to see what time checkout was. The lady let us keep our bags in our room until 3pm since no one was there during the day. We headed towards the hill that had the whalebone arch. The lower whale jawbones were from Anchorage, Alaska. While we were up on the hill, we noticed that there was a military show going on. There were some tents with a bunch of war memorabilia and the men were dressed in uniform. There was even an American tent at the very end! Afterwards, we walked to the abbey where we ascended 200 steps to reach it. There was a graveyard where Bram Stoker's story of Dracula was written. There is such an amazing history here it's amazing! We walked around the abbey a bit and took LOADS of pictures! We walked to the graveyard and took some pictures. The view of the eastern coastline was absolutely gorgeous. It was a very picturesque view and I could hardly believe my eyes at how beautiful it was. We descended the steps and headed back into town where we decided to grab lunch at a cafe. We sat upstairs where we had a view of the harbor and the abbey on the hill in the distance. While eating, Ellie had called and said she could not pick us up because a ewe started lambing. She was supposed to pick us up because no trains run out of Whitby on a Sunday. Kristen and I had to rush to the bus station. We managed to get to a bus right as it was leaving. We met Ellie in Guisborough where she picked us up. Ted and Archie (Ellie's dogs) were also in the truck with us along with Ted's littermate Bruno. They really liked Kristen and huddled up next to her in the front seat. I'll have to admit, I was a little jealous of those dogs. Here I was sitting in the back seat alone and Ted and Bruno were hanging out with Kristen in the front seat. That's ok though, Archie hung out with me in the back seat. We headed back to the farm. I showed Kristen around and she helped me feed all the ewes. Ellie warmed up some milk and I showed Kristen how to bottle-feed a lamb. She fed the lamb that we suspect has a selenium deficiency, which causes White Muscle Disease. Basically, the lamb is too weak to get up right now. He should get better after a couple administrations of seleium. Kristen managed to get 100mls of milk down the lamb, which was great! Better than what I had gotten down him the first time. Jeoff was there helping Ellie and he left the gate that divided the ewes from the tups. We had to go and get the four ewes straight away. Afterwards, we headed out for a very quick dinner at this really good Chinese restaurant. We literally had like 15 minutes for Kristen to eat. Ellie had the lady that worked there hire a taxi for Kristen. I helped her out to the taxi and Ellie and I finished dinner. We went back to the farm and there had been no lambs. We called it a night and headed off to bed.
April 19th:
Today, there was no action at the farm. I fed the animals and watched some tele. We had dinner later on and went to bed early. The ewes were nice and did not lamb at all through the night.
April 20th:
Well, today is my last day. We woke up around 9am and fed all the sheep. My train was at 12.46pm (so I thought). We went to Ellie's daughter's house for a cup of tea. Her daughter has this enormous estate! The front drive was huge but the backyard was HUGE!!!!!! It even had it's own forest with thickets of trees all over! There was a little pagoda in the middle of a small pond that was lovely. I walked around with the dogs. After I walked around a bit, we left and headed back so I could get ready. Ellie's friend Heather and her husband picked me up and drove me to Darlington station. I got there and had missed the train. I had thought originally that the train was at 12.46pm when in reality, it was at 12.26pm. Oh well, I had to purchase another ticket and wait another half hour before the next train arrived. I got home to Edinburgh and was so relieved to be back in my flat. I went grocery shopping and had Kristen over for dinner.
PICTURES: So, I am now going to work on uploading photos for you all. Check the link at the top on the right.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Second Update from North Yorkshire...
April 2nd:
Well, today we had no lambs and just a day of work. We had to feed the chickens and the rest of the animals. For dinner, I made beef Cantonese with oyster sauce, however, I forgot to put the oyster sauce in. It was still tasty! We went to sleep with extremely full bellies and were awoken by the sound of bleating ewes. I went out to go check around 1am to see what was going on but the ewes must have been spooked by something. I went to go stand in with one of the ewes so the lamb could feed because if no one stands in with the lamb, the mum head butts the little lamb around. She never bonded properly with her lamb and hasn’t taken him since. As I was standing there, all of the ewes closest to the outside area were spooked by something yet again and it really frightened me! I wasn’t sure what the heck was out there that scared them because all I could see was the darkness. Was most likely a fox or badger though. I went right back to sleep after that.
April 3rd:
Today we woke up early and started feeding the animals since Gary was not here. A man named Jeoff came around 11am with two bags of hens that Ellie purchased from him. I went out to the chicken coop to help him get them in and we had a hard time getting them out of the bags because they kept gripping the bag with their claws. We finished and then spent a lot of time in the caravan since it had rained all day. We had chili for dinner and it was extremely tasty. Right as we were going to bed, Ellie noticed that there were two new lambs walking around the big pen! So we ran out and immediately isolated the mum and two lambs. We cleaned them and gave them scour drench and sprayed their navels with iodine. After we were finished we went to bed.
April 4th:
Happy Easter! At around 3am this morning we woke up and noticed a lamb walking around the pen on the sheep camera in the caravan. We immediately went out to go take care of the lamb and we couldn’t find the mum right away. After looking for a minute, we found her in the corner and when she turned around, we could see that her uterus had prolapsed. You could see the cotyledons and the remnants of the placenta attached to one of the cotyledons. We called the vet out and when she arrived she administered an epidural to stop the contractions and obviously for pain as well. It took her about 5 minutes to get the uterus back in. We finally went to bed around 4am but did not get much sleep because one of the twin lambs that were born the day before was quite cold and had labored respirations. We figured he had come down with pneumonia as a possible result of him being born backwards and aspirating fluid. So we took him in the caravan where it was warm because Ellie’s heat box for the lambs was not working. The lamb bleated all morning so we got no sleep. When we got up we put the lamb back in with his mum since he was much warmer and respirations had slowed down. We fed all the animals and had to trim sheep feet today. That entailed me catching sheep and flipping them over. My back was so sore after we were finished. We went to Ellie’s house for dinner and she made roast beef with Marsala and onion sauce, which was excellent! We came back and were so tired so we went to sleep right away and quite early.
April 5th:
Today was uneventful with no lambing activity, We went to Farmway to pick up bedding for the horse stalls and headed back to the farm. We were exhausted by the last couple of days and had slept until noon so the day had gone by quite quickly. We had pinnochio pie for dinner(minced meat, potatoes and gravy in a pastry filling). Sort of like a shepards pie. It was very good and we also had watercress soup that Ellie had made that was excellent. We watched Blades of Glory and went to bed.
April 6th:
Today was a sad day. The mum that had the twins had been getting worse over the last two days. We gave an injection of Calcium to see if that would help and it didn’t. We gave calcium because we were thinking that the ewe may have milk fever. We left her in the pen and went inside to watch them on TV. About an hour passed and we noticed the ewe’s respiratory rate had significantly increased and her abdomen was distended. I gave an injection of an anti-inflammatory and we gave some oral glucose since she had stopped eating altogether. As time went on, the ewe’s condition worsened, except not she was showing neurological symptoms. I smelled her breath and it did not smell as if she had ketosis. She began bobbing her head and foaming a bit at the mouth. I palpated her abdomen and it felt like bloat to me. Her menace response was poor and pupillary light reflex was ok. The vet came out after we called and gave more calcium and then left. About a half hour later, the ewe gave a couple of big breaths and fell silent. Ellie will be getting a necropsy done tomorrow to see what exactly happened to the ewe. We now have two lambs that we need to pair up with a new mum. Hopefully she will take them. We had curry for dinner tonight at this Indian food restaurant near where Ellie lives and I kid you not, the first breath I took when inside this restaurant felt as if I had inhaled fire. My lungs stung and I started to cough. The smell of Indian spices in the air was strong. We ordered curry and had a few kebabs with nan bread, delicious! We headed back to the farm and checked on the sheep when we got back. Again, a very uneventful evening for lambing. I think they are organizing a massive lambing night and will all decide to deliver at the same time. Oh well, if it happens…it happens. Went to sleep around 12am and the two lambs inside the box in the caravan were vocal ALL night long as well as this bloody rooster behind the caravan that vocalizes at the most random times. It gets quite annoying when you are trying to catch some Z’s.
April 7th:
Today we woke up and fed the animals. At around 12pm, there was a ewe that was showing signs that she was going into labor. We isolated her in a separate pen from the other ewes. About six hours went on and the vulva was still closed with no signs of mucus or a water bag and the ewe was straining as if trying to deliver but couldn’t. We called the vet out and he did a vaginal examination and said that the cervix was still closed and that the ewe was in her first stage of labor and that we should expect a lamb within the next 24 hours. We adjusted the camera so that we could see her a bit better. Ellies friend brought us homemade curry, which was delicious! Her friend left and I checked on the ewe that was in labor and the vulva was still closed tightly with no signs of mucus or a water bag still. There was a bit of blood, which was most likely from earlier when the vet did the vaginal exam. Around 12am, we checked again and still no signs of a lamb. We went back in the caravan and watched a few movies on my laptop. During the movie, Ellies greyhound Archie, climbed over the cardboard box that was housing the two sick lambs. Denis, one of the lambs, looked up and saw something on Archie’s abdomen that resembled a teat. Dennis latched on and Archie had this look of shock on his face. We were laughing so hard, but Archie was seeing no humor in what had just occurred. We stayed up until 4.30am and I was so tired that I had to lie down. We woke up around 7am and checked the ewe again, but still, there were no signs indicating that the lamb was going to show anytime soon. We went back to sleep until about 10am.
April 8th:
At 10am we woke up to check on the ewe. We noticed that she had passed what looked like afterbirth(placenta, umbilical cord), but there was no lamb. We called the vet out to see what the heck was going on. Liz, the vet, felt around and the cervix was well closed. She worked the cervix open and felt the tip of a foot. She went through an entire bottle of lubricant trying to get this lamb out. She finally got a rope around the head and pulled the head out far enough to see if it was alive or not. The eyes were cloudy and it also smelled quite gross, indicating that the lamb had been dead for a few days. Warning to those reading on, this may get a little too descriptive for the squeamish. Liz ended up cutting off the head so that the body could come through the pelvic canal easier. She finally got the body out and it was the largest lamb I had ever seen yet! It was sad that the lamb died and the weird thing was, when we pulled the dead lamb out of the ewe, every single ewe in the stable began bleating like crazy. The good thing was, that the ewe was better. On another sad note, Dennis, the lamb that was sickly with what we thought was pneumonia began having bloody diarrhea and it got more bloody today and respiratory rate was extremely high again. The vet decided to euthanize Dennis. To cheer you all up, the lamb that lost it’s mother and was orphaned, we paired him up with the ewe that lost the lamb and they bonded very well. We fed all the animals and ate dinner and tried to go to bed…
April 9th:
At 12.45am, I heard a ewe bleating. I went out to see who it was and saw that it was a ewe in the larger pen and there was a water bag hanging out. I woke Ellie and Adele up and when we al got out there, another ewe started to go into labor. So two ewes were going at the same time. The one I had first noticed really started pushing and only two front legs were showing. She was pushing and pushing and the legs were not advancing. I was concerned so I went in the pen to check out what was going on. When I got my hand in, I felt the head, but mum was not able to push hard enough. I noticed that the lamb’s tongue was purple, so as fast as I could, I pulled the legs and worked the head out, which was extremely difficult and finally managed to get the lamb out. The lamb started breathing and I was happy. Adele was assisting the other ewe and she finally decided to deliver. The first lamb had to be pulled out as well and the second lamb too. However, the second lamb was in a breached presentation, meaning that the lamb was coming out backwards. Fortunately for the ewe and for us, the lamb was small enough where it wasn’t a problem. If it were any bigger it would have gotten wedged in the pelvic canal. We got all of the pens set up and lambs taken care of and went to bed around 3.45am. At 5.30am Adele went out to check and saw that two new lambs had been born in the big pen while we were sleeping. We got them taken care of and went back to bed around 7am and woke up around 9am. We fed the animals and at around 12pm, Adele shouted to me that there was a new lamb on the floor of the big pen. I jumped over the railing and went to check if it was ok and as I was drying the lamb off, another lamb literally just fell out of the same ewe that had delivered the lamb I was with. We made up more pens to fit in the new lambs, which took forever. After that, Jeoff and I flipped the rams and trimmed their hooves and cleaned them. They were quite infected some of them. About halfway through, Adele yelled out that there were two new lambs lying in the field in the mud outside where we had let the pregnant ewes hang out for a bit. We took care of the lambs and put them in the heating box. Jeoff and I finished with the rams and my back hurt so bad as well as my hands, which had blisters all over them from cutting the thick hooves. Ellie’s friend Heather brought dinner and afterwards, Adele left to head back to Edinburgh. We went to sleep and luckily, no ewes decided to deliver through the night and when I checked at 4am. Woohoo! Finally caught up on some well deserved sleep!
April 10th:
Today we woke up and check the ewes. No one delivered over the night. We spent all day reorganizing the pens and making room for more lambs. We let the rams go outside and the mums with the older lambs all go into the same pen. I got to drive a truck in the UK for the first time today. Granted it was only to reverse the truck, but hey, give me some credit here! No ewes decided to deliver through the night thankfully!
April 11th:
Woke up this morning at 8am to the sound of a bleating ewe in labor. Ellie had left for the day so it was all me. I gave it 45 minutes from when the water bag broke. I have been given words of wisdom by Ellie regarding lambing. Always go by OBI when lambing.
OBI = Observe Before Intervention
After 45 minutes, there was only about 1cm of a front leg showing. The ewe was pushing and pushing but the leg did not come out any further. I decided to go in and assist. When I got my hand in, I felt both front legs and the head, but it was very tight. After about 5 minutes, I finally worked the lamb out. It was a very big female lamb. I sprayed the navel of the lamb with iodine and gave an oral suspension that protects the lamb from E. Coli. The mum hadn’t let down much milk yet so I made up some volostrum (articificial colostrum) so the lamb had something in her stomach. For the rest of the day, Jeofff and I did work around the farm and around 6pm, Ellie and I went to her house for dinner. We had steak with sautéed mushrooms in a chili cream sauce with homemade chips (fries as we say in America). We went back to the farm around 10.15pm and came back to the caravan where Jerome was sleeping. We opened the door and startled him. Jerome is the nicest bloke I’ve met since I’ve been here. He works all day long and voluntarily calls Ellie to tell her he will watch the sheep for her. We walked out into the sheep shed and went to the ewe that had been sick for a while. It was a ewe that was sick before I got here for my placement. She had a pair of mummified lambs and hadn’t been well since the removal of the lambs. We went to bed around 12pm and no ewes decided to lamb during the night thankfully.
Well, today we had no lambs and just a day of work. We had to feed the chickens and the rest of the animals. For dinner, I made beef Cantonese with oyster sauce, however, I forgot to put the oyster sauce in. It was still tasty! We went to sleep with extremely full bellies and were awoken by the sound of bleating ewes. I went out to go check around 1am to see what was going on but the ewes must have been spooked by something. I went to go stand in with one of the ewes so the lamb could feed because if no one stands in with the lamb, the mum head butts the little lamb around. She never bonded properly with her lamb and hasn’t taken him since. As I was standing there, all of the ewes closest to the outside area were spooked by something yet again and it really frightened me! I wasn’t sure what the heck was out there that scared them because all I could see was the darkness. Was most likely a fox or badger though. I went right back to sleep after that.
April 3rd:
Today we woke up early and started feeding the animals since Gary was not here. A man named Jeoff came around 11am with two bags of hens that Ellie purchased from him. I went out to the chicken coop to help him get them in and we had a hard time getting them out of the bags because they kept gripping the bag with their claws. We finished and then spent a lot of time in the caravan since it had rained all day. We had chili for dinner and it was extremely tasty. Right as we were going to bed, Ellie noticed that there were two new lambs walking around the big pen! So we ran out and immediately isolated the mum and two lambs. We cleaned them and gave them scour drench and sprayed their navels with iodine. After we were finished we went to bed.
April 4th:
Happy Easter! At around 3am this morning we woke up and noticed a lamb walking around the pen on the sheep camera in the caravan. We immediately went out to go take care of the lamb and we couldn’t find the mum right away. After looking for a minute, we found her in the corner and when she turned around, we could see that her uterus had prolapsed. You could see the cotyledons and the remnants of the placenta attached to one of the cotyledons. We called the vet out and when she arrived she administered an epidural to stop the contractions and obviously for pain as well. It took her about 5 minutes to get the uterus back in. We finally went to bed around 4am but did not get much sleep because one of the twin lambs that were born the day before was quite cold and had labored respirations. We figured he had come down with pneumonia as a possible result of him being born backwards and aspirating fluid. So we took him in the caravan where it was warm because Ellie’s heat box for the lambs was not working. The lamb bleated all morning so we got no sleep. When we got up we put the lamb back in with his mum since he was much warmer and respirations had slowed down. We fed all the animals and had to trim sheep feet today. That entailed me catching sheep and flipping them over. My back was so sore after we were finished. We went to Ellie’s house for dinner and she made roast beef with Marsala and onion sauce, which was excellent! We came back and were so tired so we went to sleep right away and quite early.
April 5th:
Today was uneventful with no lambing activity, We went to Farmway to pick up bedding for the horse stalls and headed back to the farm. We were exhausted by the last couple of days and had slept until noon so the day had gone by quite quickly. We had pinnochio pie for dinner(minced meat, potatoes and gravy in a pastry filling). Sort of like a shepards pie. It was very good and we also had watercress soup that Ellie had made that was excellent. We watched Blades of Glory and went to bed.
April 6th:
Today was a sad day. The mum that had the twins had been getting worse over the last two days. We gave an injection of Calcium to see if that would help and it didn’t. We gave calcium because we were thinking that the ewe may have milk fever. We left her in the pen and went inside to watch them on TV. About an hour passed and we noticed the ewe’s respiratory rate had significantly increased and her abdomen was distended. I gave an injection of an anti-inflammatory and we gave some oral glucose since she had stopped eating altogether. As time went on, the ewe’s condition worsened, except not she was showing neurological symptoms. I smelled her breath and it did not smell as if she had ketosis. She began bobbing her head and foaming a bit at the mouth. I palpated her abdomen and it felt like bloat to me. Her menace response was poor and pupillary light reflex was ok. The vet came out after we called and gave more calcium and then left. About a half hour later, the ewe gave a couple of big breaths and fell silent. Ellie will be getting a necropsy done tomorrow to see what exactly happened to the ewe. We now have two lambs that we need to pair up with a new mum. Hopefully she will take them. We had curry for dinner tonight at this Indian food restaurant near where Ellie lives and I kid you not, the first breath I took when inside this restaurant felt as if I had inhaled fire. My lungs stung and I started to cough. The smell of Indian spices in the air was strong. We ordered curry and had a few kebabs with nan bread, delicious! We headed back to the farm and checked on the sheep when we got back. Again, a very uneventful evening for lambing. I think they are organizing a massive lambing night and will all decide to deliver at the same time. Oh well, if it happens…it happens. Went to sleep around 12am and the two lambs inside the box in the caravan were vocal ALL night long as well as this bloody rooster behind the caravan that vocalizes at the most random times. It gets quite annoying when you are trying to catch some Z’s.
April 7th:
Today we woke up and fed the animals. At around 12pm, there was a ewe that was showing signs that she was going into labor. We isolated her in a separate pen from the other ewes. About six hours went on and the vulva was still closed with no signs of mucus or a water bag and the ewe was straining as if trying to deliver but couldn’t. We called the vet out and he did a vaginal examination and said that the cervix was still closed and that the ewe was in her first stage of labor and that we should expect a lamb within the next 24 hours. We adjusted the camera so that we could see her a bit better. Ellies friend brought us homemade curry, which was delicious! Her friend left and I checked on the ewe that was in labor and the vulva was still closed tightly with no signs of mucus or a water bag still. There was a bit of blood, which was most likely from earlier when the vet did the vaginal exam. Around 12am, we checked again and still no signs of a lamb. We went back in the caravan and watched a few movies on my laptop. During the movie, Ellies greyhound Archie, climbed over the cardboard box that was housing the two sick lambs. Denis, one of the lambs, looked up and saw something on Archie’s abdomen that resembled a teat. Dennis latched on and Archie had this look of shock on his face. We were laughing so hard, but Archie was seeing no humor in what had just occurred. We stayed up until 4.30am and I was so tired that I had to lie down. We woke up around 7am and checked the ewe again, but still, there were no signs indicating that the lamb was going to show anytime soon. We went back to sleep until about 10am.
April 8th:
At 10am we woke up to check on the ewe. We noticed that she had passed what looked like afterbirth(placenta, umbilical cord), but there was no lamb. We called the vet out to see what the heck was going on. Liz, the vet, felt around and the cervix was well closed. She worked the cervix open and felt the tip of a foot. She went through an entire bottle of lubricant trying to get this lamb out. She finally got a rope around the head and pulled the head out far enough to see if it was alive or not. The eyes were cloudy and it also smelled quite gross, indicating that the lamb had been dead for a few days. Warning to those reading on, this may get a little too descriptive for the squeamish. Liz ended up cutting off the head so that the body could come through the pelvic canal easier. She finally got the body out and it was the largest lamb I had ever seen yet! It was sad that the lamb died and the weird thing was, when we pulled the dead lamb out of the ewe, every single ewe in the stable began bleating like crazy. The good thing was, that the ewe was better. On another sad note, Dennis, the lamb that was sickly with what we thought was pneumonia began having bloody diarrhea and it got more bloody today and respiratory rate was extremely high again. The vet decided to euthanize Dennis. To cheer you all up, the lamb that lost it’s mother and was orphaned, we paired him up with the ewe that lost the lamb and they bonded very well. We fed all the animals and ate dinner and tried to go to bed…
April 9th:
At 12.45am, I heard a ewe bleating. I went out to see who it was and saw that it was a ewe in the larger pen and there was a water bag hanging out. I woke Ellie and Adele up and when we al got out there, another ewe started to go into labor. So two ewes were going at the same time. The one I had first noticed really started pushing and only two front legs were showing. She was pushing and pushing and the legs were not advancing. I was concerned so I went in the pen to check out what was going on. When I got my hand in, I felt the head, but mum was not able to push hard enough. I noticed that the lamb’s tongue was purple, so as fast as I could, I pulled the legs and worked the head out, which was extremely difficult and finally managed to get the lamb out. The lamb started breathing and I was happy. Adele was assisting the other ewe and she finally decided to deliver. The first lamb had to be pulled out as well and the second lamb too. However, the second lamb was in a breached presentation, meaning that the lamb was coming out backwards. Fortunately for the ewe and for us, the lamb was small enough where it wasn’t a problem. If it were any bigger it would have gotten wedged in the pelvic canal. We got all of the pens set up and lambs taken care of and went to bed around 3.45am. At 5.30am Adele went out to check and saw that two new lambs had been born in the big pen while we were sleeping. We got them taken care of and went back to bed around 7am and woke up around 9am. We fed the animals and at around 12pm, Adele shouted to me that there was a new lamb on the floor of the big pen. I jumped over the railing and went to check if it was ok and as I was drying the lamb off, another lamb literally just fell out of the same ewe that had delivered the lamb I was with. We made up more pens to fit in the new lambs, which took forever. After that, Jeoff and I flipped the rams and trimmed their hooves and cleaned them. They were quite infected some of them. About halfway through, Adele yelled out that there were two new lambs lying in the field in the mud outside where we had let the pregnant ewes hang out for a bit. We took care of the lambs and put them in the heating box. Jeoff and I finished with the rams and my back hurt so bad as well as my hands, which had blisters all over them from cutting the thick hooves. Ellie’s friend Heather brought dinner and afterwards, Adele left to head back to Edinburgh. We went to sleep and luckily, no ewes decided to deliver through the night and when I checked at 4am. Woohoo! Finally caught up on some well deserved sleep!
April 10th:
Today we woke up and check the ewes. No one delivered over the night. We spent all day reorganizing the pens and making room for more lambs. We let the rams go outside and the mums with the older lambs all go into the same pen. I got to drive a truck in the UK for the first time today. Granted it was only to reverse the truck, but hey, give me some credit here! No ewes decided to deliver through the night thankfully!
April 11th:
Woke up this morning at 8am to the sound of a bleating ewe in labor. Ellie had left for the day so it was all me. I gave it 45 minutes from when the water bag broke. I have been given words of wisdom by Ellie regarding lambing. Always go by OBI when lambing.
OBI = Observe Before Intervention
After 45 minutes, there was only about 1cm of a front leg showing. The ewe was pushing and pushing but the leg did not come out any further. I decided to go in and assist. When I got my hand in, I felt both front legs and the head, but it was very tight. After about 5 minutes, I finally worked the lamb out. It was a very big female lamb. I sprayed the navel of the lamb with iodine and gave an oral suspension that protects the lamb from E. Coli. The mum hadn’t let down much milk yet so I made up some volostrum (articificial colostrum) so the lamb had something in her stomach. For the rest of the day, Jeofff and I did work around the farm and around 6pm, Ellie and I went to her house for dinner. We had steak with sautéed mushrooms in a chili cream sauce with homemade chips (fries as we say in America). We went back to the farm around 10.15pm and came back to the caravan where Jerome was sleeping. We opened the door and startled him. Jerome is the nicest bloke I’ve met since I’ve been here. He works all day long and voluntarily calls Ellie to tell her he will watch the sheep for her. We walked out into the sheep shed and went to the ewe that had been sick for a while. It was a ewe that was sick before I got here for my placement. She had a pair of mummified lambs and hadn’t been well since the removal of the lambs. We went to bed around 12pm and no ewes decided to lamb during the night thankfully.
Friday, April 2, 2010
Update from the sheep farm in North Yorkshire...
So, I arrived at Darlington station in North Yorkshire safely on the 27th. The train ride was absolutely beautiful with views of the ocean all the way along the East coast. The train even had WiFi available for use, which was very convenient. While I was on the train, I met this guy Evan who was from California and is going to culinary school in Edinburgh. Him and I talked for the entire ride to North Yorkshire. Exchanged info and will meet up for a pint when I get back. He was going to London to cook for a party. I arrived at the station and Ellie and Adele (Scottish girl in my class) picked me up. Ted, the dog, also came along and was very cute, but hyper. I had no cell reception and no access to internet. Boo! Since I have been unable to write on my blog, I am writing on my computer every day and keeping track of what goes on each day:
March 27th:
Today I was picked up from Darlington Station by Ellie, the farmer. She took me to her home in town and we gathered the two dogs we drove to the farm. The farm was absolutely muddy from the past few weeks and was very difficult to walk in. Ellie showed me around the farm and I met Jeffrey, which was very nice. Apparently he was in the hospital a while back from pulling poison ivy from his yard and it affected his nervous system. Ever since then, he has been slightly slower with his thought processes and speech. While checking the sheep for signs that they were ready to deliver, we spotted one that had a water bag hanging out. We sat down and observed for a bit. A lot of people thing that you are supposed to reach in right away and pull out the lamb, however, you only assist when it looks as if the ewe is having problems delivering the lamb. Ellie noticed that on front leg was out and still in the water bag. The ewe needed assistance so I jumped right in and lubricated my hands. I reached in and orientated the lamb so that both front legs and the head were positioned to come out. It was a big lamb so I had to pull quite hard! I mean, I really had to pull! The lamb came out breathing right away and I had to clean him off a bit and place him in front of mum so they could bond properly. Adele named him Wee Man Dan. Ever since his birth, I’ll say something in the sheep shed and he responds to it and bleats so loud! Was a very nice chap though. No sheep decided to deliver today. The caravan we are staying in is very small and sleeps only three people. It is actually quite nice and there is a stove/oven for cooking and there is TV as well with MANY channels! We watched CSI and NCIS tonight and had a glass of wine each. We went to bed and Adele and I took shifts checking the sheep. I checked at 3am and 5am.
March 28th:
Today we woke up and fed the chickens, ducks, horses and sheep. We had a false alarm today when one of the ewes began bleating and looking up towards the ceiling. Two indicators that the ewe may be ready to deliver the lamb. Was quite uneventful today and we watched CSI and NCIS again over dinner and wine.
March 29th:
Today was an interesting day. We did the routine feeding of the animals. We drove to Ellie’s daughter’s farm and took care of Ellie’s older flock. There were supposed to be 19 sheep but one was missing. We walked around a bit and finally found the straggler. She had apparently fallen asleep on the hillside and didn’t hear us come with the food. We finished with the sheep and headed back to the farm. Adele, Ellie and I walked out to the ram field and had to catch 10 rams for hoof trimming and deworming. We caught all but two. The two that we didn’t catch were too smart and stayed in the field. I spent a good 1.5 hours flipping the rams on their backs and trimming their hoofs. My back was so sore by the time we had finished all of the rams. We headed back and Ellie and I went to the store to get dinner while Adele stayed behind to watch over the sheep. While we were at Tesco (grocery store) Ellie received a phone call from Adele saying that one of the sheep began to deliver. We rushed to get our dinner and headed back to the farm. By the time we had gotten back to the farm, the lamb was already out. Apparently Adele had seen that the bag was still over the lamb’s face and quickly popped it so that the lamb wouldn’t suffocate. Adele had no towels so she ended up taking off her sweatshirt and used it as a towel. Was quite disgusting looking with placenta material all over it. Ellie and I headed to her home once the lamb was situated and taken care of. I finally got my shower and felt so refreshed afterwards! We headed back and ate dinner in the caravan. We went to bed and took shifts to watch for any signs of lambing. I stayed up until 1am and went out again at 3am.
March 30th:
Today we stayed in quite a bit because of the rain. We fed the animals and watched the sheep cameras. Towards the end of the day, we fed the sheep and I had to put the battery hens away. I got all but one into the hen house. I was chasing this hen around for about 10 minutes and finally gave up. Adele came out and attempted to do it by herself and couldn’t, so I helped a bit and we chased it into the hen house. Ellie made this amazing seafood pasta dinner with prawns, scallops, mussels and squid in a rich creamy white sauce. Was very good!!! Wee Man Dan began to feed on his own after I guided him towards his mum’s teat. Mum kept on battering him away and wasn’t being very motherly with him. We had chicken and potatoes tonight and waited for the lambing to start, which it didn’t again. I was up around 1am and fed the lambs. There was no activity for the rest of the night.
March 31st:
After a night of no lambing activity, we woke up and Gary, the man Ellie hires to come out and help with the farm work, was feeding the animals. We went out and fed the lambs and then went into town, a town called Stokesly and went into a fish and chip shop where I met Roy “Chubby” Brown. He was very funny and apparently he is a very famous comedian. Google him and you will see. Also, was having a conversation with Ellie and she is close friends with (Tanya and Lisa may be slightly jealous) Robert Patterson. They invited the family and kids for a reunion next week and he will probably be coming up as well to the pub around the corner from the farm. I watched the first Twilight but still haven’t finished the second and don’t think I will, was not very into it. So meeting him will be just like meeting any other average person to me. I’ll try and get a picture or two for you guys though. The rain has been coming down like crazy here and apparently back in Edinburgh, it has been snowing. The weather has been horrible all over the UK right now. The East Coast Rail from Edinburgh to Newcastle has been shut down because of landslides. Good thing I wasn’t coming down today, I would have been stranded at the rail station! It started hailing a bit here, but not for very long. We are now watching the news and are waiting for a man to come and relieve us while we head back to Ellie’s home and shower up and eat dinner.
April 1st:
So, today we woke up to the sound of bleating lambs and ended up lambing 8 ewes!!! We got absolutely no sleep and have been up since about 2am…blah! Ok, I know when you are reading this, it won’t be but April Fools!!! So still no lambs have been born and we are waiting for the worse, when all the ewes decide to deliver at the same time… Hopefully that won’t happen at all. This morning was uneventful and Gary came by to feed the animals once again. He feeds only on the weekdays and on the weekends we feed. Ellie and Adele went out for a bit today while I stayed behind and watched the sheep. I talked with Kristen for a bit and talked about when she is coming down to visit me while I am here. We are going to take a train to Whitby. Apparently, Whitby is the place where the story of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein took place. Totally cool! They came back and Ellie and I went back to her house where I had a wonderful shower! Was nice to sit down and relax. Actually, we have been doing a lot of relaxing since the ewes haven’t decided to lamb yet. Adele and I were feeding the chickens today and something hilarious happened. Adele was inside the chicken coop and one of the battery hens jumped up on top of her head (she has a lot of hair which may have looked like a nest to the hen). I had to grab the hen and set it back down and within seconds of letting it down, the hen decided to go to defecate. If I had waited any longer, Adele would have had white droppings in her hair. Ick! After feeding the animals tonight, Ellie made this fantastic dinner of risotto and prawns in a onion/garlic/tomato puree/Niersteiner sauce. Was excellent! We watched a bit of NCIS and now I am going to head to bed since I have the 4am shift. Going to get a bit of sleep now and hopefully tomorrow day, we will have some lambing activity going on.
More to come, have to go right now but will post more. Hope all is well and talk to you all soon! Will have pictures up in a couple of weeks when I return to Edinburgh.
March 27th:
Today I was picked up from Darlington Station by Ellie, the farmer. She took me to her home in town and we gathered the two dogs we drove to the farm. The farm was absolutely muddy from the past few weeks and was very difficult to walk in. Ellie showed me around the farm and I met Jeffrey, which was very nice. Apparently he was in the hospital a while back from pulling poison ivy from his yard and it affected his nervous system. Ever since then, he has been slightly slower with his thought processes and speech. While checking the sheep for signs that they were ready to deliver, we spotted one that had a water bag hanging out. We sat down and observed for a bit. A lot of people thing that you are supposed to reach in right away and pull out the lamb, however, you only assist when it looks as if the ewe is having problems delivering the lamb. Ellie noticed that on front leg was out and still in the water bag. The ewe needed assistance so I jumped right in and lubricated my hands. I reached in and orientated the lamb so that both front legs and the head were positioned to come out. It was a big lamb so I had to pull quite hard! I mean, I really had to pull! The lamb came out breathing right away and I had to clean him off a bit and place him in front of mum so they could bond properly. Adele named him Wee Man Dan. Ever since his birth, I’ll say something in the sheep shed and he responds to it and bleats so loud! Was a very nice chap though. No sheep decided to deliver today. The caravan we are staying in is very small and sleeps only three people. It is actually quite nice and there is a stove/oven for cooking and there is TV as well with MANY channels! We watched CSI and NCIS tonight and had a glass of wine each. We went to bed and Adele and I took shifts checking the sheep. I checked at 3am and 5am.
March 28th:
Today we woke up and fed the chickens, ducks, horses and sheep. We had a false alarm today when one of the ewes began bleating and looking up towards the ceiling. Two indicators that the ewe may be ready to deliver the lamb. Was quite uneventful today and we watched CSI and NCIS again over dinner and wine.
March 29th:
Today was an interesting day. We did the routine feeding of the animals. We drove to Ellie’s daughter’s farm and took care of Ellie’s older flock. There were supposed to be 19 sheep but one was missing. We walked around a bit and finally found the straggler. She had apparently fallen asleep on the hillside and didn’t hear us come with the food. We finished with the sheep and headed back to the farm. Adele, Ellie and I walked out to the ram field and had to catch 10 rams for hoof trimming and deworming. We caught all but two. The two that we didn’t catch were too smart and stayed in the field. I spent a good 1.5 hours flipping the rams on their backs and trimming their hoofs. My back was so sore by the time we had finished all of the rams. We headed back and Ellie and I went to the store to get dinner while Adele stayed behind to watch over the sheep. While we were at Tesco (grocery store) Ellie received a phone call from Adele saying that one of the sheep began to deliver. We rushed to get our dinner and headed back to the farm. By the time we had gotten back to the farm, the lamb was already out. Apparently Adele had seen that the bag was still over the lamb’s face and quickly popped it so that the lamb wouldn’t suffocate. Adele had no towels so she ended up taking off her sweatshirt and used it as a towel. Was quite disgusting looking with placenta material all over it. Ellie and I headed to her home once the lamb was situated and taken care of. I finally got my shower and felt so refreshed afterwards! We headed back and ate dinner in the caravan. We went to bed and took shifts to watch for any signs of lambing. I stayed up until 1am and went out again at 3am.
March 30th:
Today we stayed in quite a bit because of the rain. We fed the animals and watched the sheep cameras. Towards the end of the day, we fed the sheep and I had to put the battery hens away. I got all but one into the hen house. I was chasing this hen around for about 10 minutes and finally gave up. Adele came out and attempted to do it by herself and couldn’t, so I helped a bit and we chased it into the hen house. Ellie made this amazing seafood pasta dinner with prawns, scallops, mussels and squid in a rich creamy white sauce. Was very good!!! Wee Man Dan began to feed on his own after I guided him towards his mum’s teat. Mum kept on battering him away and wasn’t being very motherly with him. We had chicken and potatoes tonight and waited for the lambing to start, which it didn’t again. I was up around 1am and fed the lambs. There was no activity for the rest of the night.
March 31st:
After a night of no lambing activity, we woke up and Gary, the man Ellie hires to come out and help with the farm work, was feeding the animals. We went out and fed the lambs and then went into town, a town called Stokesly and went into a fish and chip shop where I met Roy “Chubby” Brown. He was very funny and apparently he is a very famous comedian. Google him and you will see. Also, was having a conversation with Ellie and she is close friends with (Tanya and Lisa may be slightly jealous) Robert Patterson. They invited the family and kids for a reunion next week and he will probably be coming up as well to the pub around the corner from the farm. I watched the first Twilight but still haven’t finished the second and don’t think I will, was not very into it. So meeting him will be just like meeting any other average person to me. I’ll try and get a picture or two for you guys though. The rain has been coming down like crazy here and apparently back in Edinburgh, it has been snowing. The weather has been horrible all over the UK right now. The East Coast Rail from Edinburgh to Newcastle has been shut down because of landslides. Good thing I wasn’t coming down today, I would have been stranded at the rail station! It started hailing a bit here, but not for very long. We are now watching the news and are waiting for a man to come and relieve us while we head back to Ellie’s home and shower up and eat dinner.
April 1st:
So, today we woke up to the sound of bleating lambs and ended up lambing 8 ewes!!! We got absolutely no sleep and have been up since about 2am…blah! Ok, I know when you are reading this, it won’t be but April Fools!!! So still no lambs have been born and we are waiting for the worse, when all the ewes decide to deliver at the same time… Hopefully that won’t happen at all. This morning was uneventful and Gary came by to feed the animals once again. He feeds only on the weekdays and on the weekends we feed. Ellie and Adele went out for a bit today while I stayed behind and watched the sheep. I talked with Kristen for a bit and talked about when she is coming down to visit me while I am here. We are going to take a train to Whitby. Apparently, Whitby is the place where the story of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein took place. Totally cool! They came back and Ellie and I went back to her house where I had a wonderful shower! Was nice to sit down and relax. Actually, we have been doing a lot of relaxing since the ewes haven’t decided to lamb yet. Adele and I were feeding the chickens today and something hilarious happened. Adele was inside the chicken coop and one of the battery hens jumped up on top of her head (she has a lot of hair which may have looked like a nest to the hen). I had to grab the hen and set it back down and within seconds of letting it down, the hen decided to go to defecate. If I had waited any longer, Adele would have had white droppings in her hair. Ick! After feeding the animals tonight, Ellie made this fantastic dinner of risotto and prawns in a onion/garlic/tomato puree/Niersteiner sauce. Was excellent! We watched a bit of NCIS and now I am going to head to bed since I have the 4am shift. Going to get a bit of sleep now and hopefully tomorrow day, we will have some lambing activity going on.
More to come, have to go right now but will post more. Hope all is well and talk to you all soon! Will have pictures up in a couple of weeks when I return to Edinburgh.
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