The story didn’t start out so happy. I found little Dylan almost frozen – neglected by his mother and left to die at 1 day old. I’d checked his mom and it wasn’t a matter of no milk to be had, but that was the past – he needed help FAST. I tube fed him with some nice warm milk replacer and bundled him in towels. It was a work day so he and all the paraphernalia was bundled into a box and off we went to work. He never picked up much steam that day – even his sucking response was weak and he wasn’t on his feet as he had been right after birth. A good friend and fellow lamb lover brought over some hot packs to microwave to wrap him with to help bring up his temperature. His mouth got warm, but he didn’t seem to have much will to live.
After work, in one final effort to save him, I gave him 2 ounces of milk with a syringe (no sucking required). Low and behold – about 2 hours later he began to hold his head up and ask for food! He was walking within 4 hours, but because he had been so close to death by starvation, I needed to feed him little meals each 2-3 hours. The following day I was excited that he had made the 2 day mark – when they get their ear tag, tail band, and registration mug shot. I weighed him and his brother and noted his brother had lost weight since birth. I watched him closely. He was persistently following mom around and had an arched back. Against strenuous objections from both mom and baby I added the second boy, Duncan, to the bottle baby routine. He had strong sucking response so it wasn’t for lack of trying that he’d gone hungry.
Dylan in with the older lambs and moms.
Duncan, king of the straw bale… for now.
The next two nights the temperatures were down in the teens so I set up a lamb camp in the basement inside my dog pen. The new routine was to leave them with the older lambs during the day if I was at home and bring them into the house at night. If it was a work day, they’d hang out in the bed of my pick-up and get fed their mid-day meal on the road.
Just as they graduated from 4 to 3 feedings a day, I received a call asking if I had any bottle babies for sale. This woman’s niece was interested in being part of a 4H project where she needed to care for a bottle baby for 2 or more weeks. Eureka! With more than a few texts and phone calls we arranged for the 2 boys to be picked up the following day. Going to a new home in Iowa meant they needed health certificates from the vet. Vets are incredibly busy people this time of year, but I was able to book a time and took the boys over in a medium dog carrier and they checked out.
The boys charmed their way into the hearts of their new Aunt and Gramma and soon were on the road to their new home and lots of snuggles to come. …and they lived happily ever after… under assumed names.
