Coyote Ridge FarmsWelcome To Our Rural Blog

Yesterday was another busy day here on the farm. It was a pleasant morning, unlike most of our mornings. While I was out in the winter pasture, making sure my Highlander cattle were doing well… and checking for developing udders, Carol called me. She asked if I was in the house. When I told her that I was closer to the east line-fence that I was to the house, she sounded disappointed. She was hoping I was able to bring her a camera. It seems she was in the cow yard, behind the barn, observing one of the farm’s Katahdins. The ewe was in full labor.

By the time I made my rounds in the pastures, checked the Ritchie™ waterer and was able to get to Carol’s location, there was already a lamb on the ground.  Carol thought that the ewe was going to have twins.  From time to time, she could see (or thought she could see) tiny hooves under the ewe’s tail.  A few short minutes later, after 3-4 pushes, there was another lamb on the ground.

With that said, I ran back to the house and grabbed the camera for Carol.  Here are a couple of shots she snapped of the new twins.

The ewe made a birthing nest for herself

This little guy was born 20 minutes ahead of his sister

This is the ewe lamb (twin)

As you can see, this ewe had her lambs in a makeshift birthing “nest”… outside.  It was obvious that she cleared the snow from the area to expose the dry hay – hay from where we fed a round bale a week earlier.  This Katahdin had her twins outside, without human intervention.  That is one of the reasons Carol and I have selected some of the breeds we have, here on the farm… because they are as close to the true animal as they were 100+ years ago.  We prefer critters that are able to eat forage (without being grain-fed), birth easily and naturally provide us and our customers with high quality proteins (meat & milk).  As of now, there are still a few animals that man has not screwed up.  As Cody Holmes pointed out on his latest blog post entitled ‘In Search Of Sustainability‘ some cattle lived to be productive for up to 35 years.  According to Mr. Holmes, it is rare that the average beef cow remains productive past the age of 6.  How sad is this.  It seems we, in all our modern wisdom, have bred the real farm (or ranch) out of the animal and merely created pet-quality livestock.

Related posts:

1. This Season's New Lambs
2. Cornstalks Are Baled And A New Goat Was Born
3. One less twin