Day 6 Welcome to Iceland Carly , no time to waste

Hello to all. My first official Iceland Blog,

I arrived on a red eye flight to ice land, Grace and Melissa picked me up at Keflavik airport at 5 am. We detoured on our way home and spent some of the early morning in Reykjavik. It was early enough that there were no people, just street cats out to greet us. We grabbed a croissant and walked around the quiet city admiring the street art, monuments and of course some window shopping.




 After grabbing some groceries we headed to the farm. I do not remember any of the ride and slept like a baby. We arrived to a long driveway, several sheep sunning themselves in the driveway, with Icelandic horses on one side and Icelandic sheep on the other. It was an amazing introduction.




















After a quick meal we rested for the evening, until our night shift. I have arrived just as peak lambing has hit, for a first night it was full to say the least. We had upwards of 18 ewes lamb in our 9pm-2am shift. We had several two year old ewes lamb with difficulty passing the horn buds through the cervix. After watching the loop technique and assisting Grace on several births I attempted a successful pull on a very large very stuck ram whose large buds made for a great resistance on the loop. His sister squirted out afterwards and mom was quite relieved for the whole thing to be over. One of the older ewes mannaged to escape our eye, possibly her sack popped before we were able to catch her, but she managed to birth in the group pen. Grace quickly grabbed the lamb and I did my first cross pen wrangle (where you grab the horns and pull with all your might in an area where you cannot let go or the sheep can get away). All the while Melissa disentangled a lamb ball and helped straighten some beautiful twins out. Later in the evening upon investigating some hungry lamb cries I found a very small ram lamb looking lethargic and crying. Upon further inspection mum was found with a very lopsided udder. I was able to milk her and found her to be displaying signs of mastitis (watery, chunky and bloody milk) With two small newborn lambs Grace and I did decide to tube the smaller lamb and add a heat lamp to the jug. He was adopted to a mom with a single later that morning as well as placed him under a lamp.

Day 5: The Running of the Sheep

They seem to enjoy sunning themselves on the warm driveway. Luckily there is a livestock gate between the driveway and the road!

Today was the first day the weather was nice enough to release the beasts! The ewes and older lambs in the oldest portion of the barn were sent on their merry way, which both made them happy and freed up that space for more mommas and babies to be cycled in. While Grace helped hold down the fort with the pregnant ewes, I assisted with the process of moving the sheep. Some of the sheep were trailered to the fields across the road, while other were released on the fields surrounding the farm.

One of 8 or so ewes being processed at a time, wondering if she can get back in the group pen without us noticing.

The mothers seemed to remember this process, the babies were just happy to have a new place to explore.

The trailer can hold about 8 ewes and their babies. The ewes and lambs were separated by a divider inside the trailer. They weren't too pleased about that, but it kept the lambs from being accidentally stepped on in transit. Before getting them in the trailer, the lambs were all given some medication (I think a dewormer?), and any single lambs out of a mature ewe were marked, so that when the sheep are checked later, the person doing the checking won't panic when they see only one lamb (yearlings typically have one lamb, full adults two). Each ewe was additionally checked for mastitis. And then, they were loaded in, and the screaming trailer was off to the fields!

Lambs exploring after being given dewormer.

Hello, new friend!

The same process was repeated with a group of yearlings and their babies, except they all went onto the closer fields and were far more confused by everything!

Once all the proper ewes and babies were out, I headed back to the new barn and pregnant ewes. We had one ewe who we thought was expecting triplets, as she had a green mark on her head. All the sheep are ultrasounded earlier in their pregnancies and marked according to how many lambs they have. An adult ewe gets a red mark for a single lamb, and a green mark for triplets. Twins are the most common and are not marked. Yearlings most commonly have only one lamb, and get a green mark for twins. Additionally, the number of lambs for each ewe is recorded, as are any other data about that ewe, but when we are rushed, we often go by just the head mark. This gave us a surprise with this particular ewe, as she was recorded as expecting four lambs!

The first lamb came out without major problems and was perfectly healthy. When I went in to check for the second, however, I had to flag down Grace. I was able to reposition the feet, but when I felt for the head... I wasn't sure what I was feeling. I knew I had the head, but I couldn't find the nose! Grace confirmed my suspicions: we were most likely dealing with a stillborn and/or deformed lamb. When she got the lamb out, it was indeed stillborn, and looked mostly normal, save for its nose, which was deeply squished in and probably the cause of death and due to crowding in the womb. The ewe went on to have another healthy baby, and we thought we were done... until we came back later and saw her having another! Sadly, this lamb was also deformed and stillborn. I guess four lambs is too many! The ewe and two live lambs seemed to be doing well, though.

Later in the day, I experienced the first death of a lamb I was delivering. The mother had delivered a large, healthy ewe lamb with a little help from me, and I subsequently checked the position of the second and made a minor correction. I let her work on it by herself, and when I came back, one of the lamb's legs had gotten tucked back since I corrected them. Nonetheless, the mother took it in stride and was able to deliver the lamb with little trouble, as this one was smaller than the first. It was another beautiful ewe lamb, very much alive, however there was a serious problem-- she could not breathe. Grace and I both worked to to make sure her airways were clear and Grace even did mouth to mouth, as well as dabbed alcohol under the lamb's nose (which often induces them to take a breath). The lamb's heart was beating quite strongly for what seemed like an impossibly long time, but she simply could not inhale on her own, and she passed away. Based on what we had observed, Snaedis and Helgi think the most likely explanation is the lamb had deformed lungs/diaphragm.

On a much more positive front, Pip is doing very well! She makes up for her tiny size (2.6 lbs/1.2kg) with extreme sass and can now reach her mom's udder with a little help.

Pip is also disproportionately loud for her size.

Some more cuddle buddies.

Seems like an odd arrangement but they seem happy.

Maybe a lamb, maybe a marshmallow Peep.

Day 4: Between a Ewe and a Hard Place

A white wagtail, known as 'mariuerla' in Iceland and "Ahhhhh! So cute!" by me.

We began the day with a lovely serenade from this little guy on the front porch. At the barn, I found the yearling resting comfortably under the heat lamp while Xena and Oolong cuddled together for warmth in the corner.

Not the face of a sheep who is sorry for her actions.

Xena and Oolong have it covered, though.

Grace and I found ourselves dealing with an interesting situation later. Grace spotted a ewe in labor (so nothing out of the ordinary yet). Normally when a ewe is found to be in labor, we shut all the aisle doors except for any leading to the jug we have prepared for her, and then move her out of the group pen. The ewe then follows the corridors and any blockades we have set up to direct her, and ends up in the jug (in theory). This minimizes the time the ewe is handled, which is easier on everyone involved. Anyway, Grace had caught the ewe and was moving her out of the pen, when Myla, the farm's Border Collie, decided she wanted to "help."

Pictured: Agent of chaos, and her kong toy.

Next thing we knew, this is what the aisle leading to the jug looked like:

I tried to encourage the poor, corridor-wide, heavily pregnant ewes to go back as gently as I could, initiating a backwards shuffle-waddle from the line of ewes. Most of them turned around when they reached the corner.

Most.

We were heartbreakingly close to the group pen when the ewe in front decided she could shuffle-waddle backwards no more. She stopped and could be neither dislodged nor moved around. We tried calling Myla to fix the mess she made and she strangely had no interest in fixing it despite being very eager to help us earlier. It took Helgi wading in and basically picking up the lead ewe and turning her around to unclog the corridor.

Later, I found myself assisting a yearling with a fairly large lamb. I got him out, and felt for the position of the next, which was fine. It seemed much smaller, so I figured I'd let the yearling work on that one on her own. The next thing I knew, the tiniest lamb I'd ever seen squirted out with one push, spraying me with amniotic fluid. The yearling expressed her thanks for my help by licking the fluid off my face and hair while I was tending to the babies.

I named her 'Pip' because 'Pipsqueak' was too big a name.

Pip's a feisty little ewe, but she had to be bottlefed initially because she was too short to reach the udder! We weighed her later and she was a mere 2.5 lbs (1.1kg).

Grace managed to help a pretty mouflon ewe (Stetja, although I'm not sure I spelled it right) deliver two massive babies (around 12 lbs/5.4kg each!), a ram and a ewe. All of them took it in stride. When we came back for our next shift, however, we found the ewe lamb weak and lethargic. We treated her for watery mouth, but she passed away two hours later, a horrible lesson for me on how quickly this disease can kill a lamb. As she had been vigorous at birth, nursed, and received a preventative antibiotic like all the other lambs, the best explanation Helgi could come up with was she was so big, the colostrum she got wasn't sufficient for her body size. Even though hours had passed since her labor, Stetja was still willing to adopt a lamb from another ewe who was having trouble caring for it, because she's a champ.

We didn't have much time to dwell on the unfortunate situation because it was a crazy night of lambing. We think Helgi jinxed us earlier by telling me how to deliver lambs from weird positions, because lambs in weird positions is exactly what we ended up with. I dealt with my first case of tangled lambs (Grace says it's like trying to untie a knot you can't see, and also everything is sticky). I still don't have a mental image of how the lambs were positioned, but I picked one of the heads I could feel, found the front feet, and went from there, and that worked. Grace meanwhile was trying to move a ewe in labor and ended up with the contents of a waterbag in her boot! She didn't let that stop her, and didn't complain about it for the rest of the shift, either. It did move 'sock day' higher up on our laundry priorities, though.

Day 3: Attack of the Yearlings

The weather was a bit more spring-like today with rain instead of snow and hail. The fields are visible and the first group of sheep (non-pregnant ewes and rams) was let outside, as well as the mare and foal that were being kept in from the cold. 

We started the day with some cleaning. There were only a few ewes lambing and with everyone down at the barn we could get a lot of work done. While we cleaned, additional groups pen were put up, ewes and lambs were moved and more lambing jugs were opened up. I swept the yearling pens with a helper. While all the other yearlings panicked by my presence in the pen, she seemed curious.

Melissa worked on cleaning a pen with the older ewes, who are unphased by Melissa's presence and were more concerned about her attention not being on them and their need for scratches.

We were happy to see that in the early hours of the morning our orphans were adopted by a wonderful mother. I went to go see them, but with there new mother they could not care less about me and I don't blame them, she is an awesome mom. 

We got good news about the ewe that was not fond of her lambs and had one side of her udder that had blood clots. Helgi was able to get the larger clot that was blocking the teat and milk the majority of the clots out, by the end of the day her milk was flowing much more smoothly. She was also starting to tolerate her lambs, and maybe even liking one of them. She will continue wearing the rope on her head in the case she starts to become violent with her lambs again and we have to tie her to the side of the jug.

With so few active lambings, we spent some time checking in with some ewes and lambs that needed extra attention. I was tasked with milking out an older ewe. Snædis suggested I bring multiple one-liter bottles which I thought was funny. Just softening up one side of her udder, I milked out a full liter of milk. The ewe showed her thanks by pulling on my ponytail while I was looking underneath her. To her credit, my hair almost matches the haylage being fed to them. We ended the milking session with shoulder and chest scratches.

We had another ewe and lamb that needed some help. A ram lamb had yet to figure out how to nurse. His sister had figured it out first thing and was happily napping while we got to work. Mom was immensely patient and even positioned her legs so the teat could not be missed, but the little ram lamb went everywhere but the teat. Even after Melissa placed the teat in his mouth, he spit it out and searched up his mom's belly for food. After both Melissa and I working on this problem child, he eventually latched on and was able to nurse to everyone's relief.

Things started to pick up in the afternoon and we had a steady flow of those lambing out. Melissa was able to successfully use the patented loop technique Snædis had taught her, which she was excited about. She also had a case of triplets that made me do a double take. The 1st lamb to come out was good-sized and it was assumed the two following would be smaller. The last two were just as large as the 1st lamb making it a head scratcher... where did those lambs come from? There are two options, either the ewe had planned an elaborate magic trick to where Melissa finds out the 3rd lamb was an illusion or this ewe's uterus is the Tardis.

When we returned for our night shift, I helped an older ewe with her single lamb, and given her sweet mom skills, she was given a lamb from a yearling that had twins. First-time moms usually do best with one lamb to look after and feed... two can be a bit overwhelming. When I took the lamb, the mother did not notice. She was eating a snack, took a nap, woke-up 30 minutes later to realize she only had one lamb. She was distraught and decided to scream non-stop for the rest of our shift (which was until 2am). Not only was the lamb currently in her care clearly not the favorite, she got another yearling next to her to scream in unison for some time. We ignored her, so she climbed up the side of her lambing jug to announce to the whole barn I am a baby snatcher.

 We had a number of yearlings lamb out through the day and three that decided they wanted to lamb out together at midnight. Given the size of my hands, I am not helpful when it comes to yearlings until the lamb has passed the pelvis, so it was all Melissa, which she took in stride. This would have have been easy breezy for the two of us but we could not communicate with the angry yearling screaming over us. Also wanting to be part of the group an older ewe with triplets started to lamb out. The first yearling lambed out without any assistance unless you count us cheering her on and checking the lamb's position. The 2nd yearling passed a water sac, then got up and started eating, which was very concerning. By this time, Snædis's dad, Hallí, had come to switch shifts with us and decided to check things out. He felt two heads and four legs all trying to come out at the same time. With swift maneuvering, he had her first lamb out. After giving her some time to meet her lamb, Melissa went to check the 2nd lamb who turned out to be upside down. With a gentle twist and pull, the 2nd lamb was out. Triplet mom was also not concerned with the passing of her water sac which was because her 1st lamb was a stillborn in a tucked position, unable to move into the birth canal. Once the stillborn was removed she easily had her last two, very lively lambs. After all this action, we left Hallí to keep watch of the last, very shocked looking, yearling. We called it a night after saying goodbye to a two of our favorite lambs, Oolong and Xena Warrior Princess, who were very tiny lambs a yearling had yesterday but continues to need some extra guidance when it comes to nursing.

Þórhallur 
Þórhallur 
Þórhallu

Day 2: Hail Yes

Looking pretty done with this nonsense.

For Grace and I, barn chores started at 11:00am. The weather was rather spectacularly unpleasant. Initially there were just strong winds, but then there was snow, fierce enough that when I looked up from the sheep and out a window, there was just whiteness. Ear tagging and moving of sheep commenced as usual. Sadly, our worst fears about the sickly lamb from yesterday were realized-- she had watery mouth, which is an opportunistic E-coli infection, and unfortunately is not treatable after a certain stage (she had received antibiotics earlier, but to no avail). She was euthanized because she was trembling and seizing and there was no reason to prolong that. The orphans must not have had healing powers, but they did snuggle with her in her last few hours, and I like to think that helped.

That was depressing, so here's a picture of the farm's cat cuddling up near me.

During a lull in activity, I got some grain and tried making friends with Becca Jr., a spunky leadersheep. I've been informed that if I'm friends with Becca Jr. things will be much easier for me. I got her to take some grain and was able to scratch her head, so hopefully that's progress.

It's also quite possible she just wanted to spite Grace.

Becca's mother Kruna, meanwhile, doesn't shun anyone as long as they have grain.

Mostly wishful thinking, but the black spot on this ewe lamb's back as well as her facial markings reminded me a little of Fiddlehead back at Witter Farm.

Later, I found myself having difficulty helping a ewe deliver a large lamb. I flagged down Snaedis, who showed me her patented method wherein she puts a loop over the lamb's head, puts her foot in the other end of the loop and uses that to apply pressure, leaving her hands free to help loosen the vaginal opening and anything else to help the lamb out. I wish I had a picture of that, but it took her mere seconds to pop the lamb out, it seemed. It was rather awe-inspiring.

I had a good laugh later when I was making the rounds and checking for labor signs. There was one yearling I paused near for further evaluation because she seemed to be working on something, pushing a bit, and sitting up off the ground slightly. I soon found out, however, that all she was working on was a fart!

We went on break at 3pm. The good news is the snow had stopped. The bad news is it hailed on us instead as we walked back up the hill to the house. The hailstones were about the same size and shape as grains of road salt, so it was just unpleasant rather than painful or injury causing. I tried to keep my hands from getting hailed on by tucking them in my pockets and ended up with pockets full of hailstones for my trouble because the hail simply blew in around my wrists.

The walk seems longer when you're walking through hail.

When Grace and I returned to the barn around 9, there was a new leadersheep lamb. I'm sure leadersheep have been described here before, but for those who haven't read through all the previous blog posts, they are a sort of subspecies of Icelandic sheep who are taller, leaner, and more intelligent than a typical Icelandic sheep. I didn't get a good photo opportunity for that one, unfortunately.

Luckily Grace got this picture of a different leadersheep lamb being sassy.

There was also a yearling who'd had two of the tiniest babies ever. She didn't quite grasp the whole "you are a mom now" concept and was really scared and kept trying to escape the situation by jumping out the hay trough.

"What are these things?"

Oh right, these are babies. They do also resemble jellybeans more than the average lamb.

I was tasked with making sure the babies got something to eat, which involved pinning a very squirrely and motivated yearling, and then getting the babies to actually latch, which they didn't quite know how to do, which made a total of four of us who didn't quite know what to do. After much struggling on everyone's part, the babies had full bellies and settled down for a nap.

Soon after, I found myself assisting a somewhat feral sheep who had a correctly positioned lamb but didn't care to push it out. I stepped in when its tongue started turning blue. The problems continued afterwards, because she was totally uninterested in licking it off. She got the second lamb out without assistance, but subsequently decided to eat instead of tending to the babes. I soon found out a possible reason when I went to strip her teats-- she has chronic mastitis and her teats were full of milk clots. I was able to clear one teat, from which we obtained colostrum for the twins. Meanwhile, the triplet mom that caused us some stress yesterday, in the adjacent jug, picked up the mastitis ewe's slack and began cleaning the soggy lambs through the slats. Since it was a cold night and snow was coming in through the vents, we ended up popping both lambs in her jug temporarily for her to finish the job.

A later shot of our MVP of the night snuggling with her lambs.

Our last lambing before we left at 1 or 2 am (not sure... time is a blur, or an illusion, or something like that.... I'm a bit tired) was a yearling expecting twins. Grace had checked the position of the first lamb and found that it had one leg back. Since I have smaller hands, I went in and was able to find the second leg and pull it forward, but the problems did not end there. The lamb was big, and had a big head, and big ol' horn buds. I tried, but I just could not get a lambing loop over its head. I had to resort to pulling the legs, as Grace assisted by pressing the vulva area to help push the lamb's head out. It was tough. I nearly cried because I felt bad for the yearling, and Grace was pretty sure the lamb was dead. When we got him out, however, he was very much alive, and the yearling immediately accepted him and began licking him vigorously. The second lamb was also large, but came out more easily. The yearling had to take some time before her legs started working again, but they did, and mom and babies all seemed to be in good spirits when we left.

I thought the baby might even suckle like this, but she waited until mom got up.

Proud mother and both of her giant babies.

Day 1ish...

Grace and I arrived in Iceland at approximately 7:00 in the morning Iceland time, which is four hours ahead of Maine. The first half of the plane ride was impressively turbulent, rather reminiscent of a ride down the Witter Farm road, except this ride was four hours long and 34,000 feet above ground (or around 10,000 meters... must remember to use metric here!). Nonetheless, we made it without any issues and I think Grace was even able to sleep during the flight, because she is some kind of superhuman. During the hour long ride to Hestur Farm, we experienced rain, snow, hail and sun, all of which looked pretty in their own way against the Icelandic landscape.

Once at Hestur, which is apparently the swan capital of Iceland, judging by the number of swans in the fields, we got a tour of the farm, primarily for my benefit, although I think Grace enjoyed seeing all the familiar faces again. Most of the horses were outside, unperturbed by the snow covering the ground, but one mare was inside with her impressively stocky 1-2 day old foal.

Shortly after this photo was taken, the foal asked me: "do you even lift?"

Once back with the sheep, my first task was to take the "placenta stick" and remove passed placentas from the jugs. Some of the sheep appeared offended that I would take their placentas, but most didn't mind. It was a good opportunity to meet individual sheep and also to watch what all the more experienced people were doing, which was ear tagging and weighing, and subsequently moving ewes and lambs out of their jugs and into shared quarters. Although things had been quiet when we arrived, it wasn't long before we were moving ewes in labor into newly open jugs. 

Cuddle buddies.

Cuddle buddies x5

The first lamb I helped deliver at Hestur!

In between sheep, the jugs were swept to remove any poop or other substances stuck in the grates, and then sprinkled with a pink antibacterial powder. I have no idea what's in the powder but it's a rather cheerful color and smells like fruit flavored Tums, of all things.

This ewe decided she liked me and she liked back scratches too.

My new friend looking proud of her kids.

Grace and I got a much needed nap break in the afternoon, then we headed back to the barn until 1:00am. This time we were on our own. Things began calmly, but soon all the open jugs were filled. Despite us checking for labor signs as often as possible, one ewe managed to have a lamb while in with the other ewes. Two other ewes tried to lick it off, and one tried to follow the lamb and its actual mother to the jug. Since the first delivery for that ewe went so well, we let our guards down while we were assisting other ewes. When we next checked that ewe, she had a head out but no legs and refused to stop pushing vigorously. Grace managed pull one leg out, which was sufficient for delivery in this instance. I soon got my first experience delivering a lamb from a yearling. That one also required re-positioning, and I actually ended up with a small bruise from where a poorly-timed contraction jammed my hand against her pelvic bone with surprising force. After this delivery, I walked by our problem ewe and noticed legs sticking out again (surprise! It's triplets). This one was backwards but a swift pull from Grace got it out without injury to mom or baby.

We dubbed her the Diva Sheep. The purple means she will stay on the home fields but it may also signify royalty.

As we were getting ready to leave, two ewes went into labor. One of them gave the best pushes when given encouragement (we found out later she had given birth to one of the farm's most prized rams and it sort of went to her head). The other was expecting triplets, but one had died probably several weeks prior. The mother and other two lambs were healthy and well, and one of the lambs was positively huge (perhaps she crowded out the stillborn one).

In all, it was an overwhelming but good first day!

A sickly ewe lamb placed with the orphans in case they had healing powers like Steve.

The orphans. I could believe they have healing powers, but they primarily have screaming powers.

Hello to all,

Attempting my first blog post state side. Very excited to spend ample time with one of my favorite animals(  Icelandic Sheep ). The university of Maine has one more ewe left to go this lambing season. We wait on her( Willow) with excitement. Thank you to all who made this opportunity available to me, I am beyond grateful.

SHEEP