Let’s talk baby animals. They are the sweetest things, all cute and little and fluffy. They say a new season is here and that life is full of magic. This year two lambs were born on the farm. They went from wobbling around to running so quickly. Now they run around happily and then collapse into a pile of cute from all that hard work they just did. We also got calves for the first time and those two run for shear joy. With spring around the corner hatching will commence and fill our lives with tiny walking balls of fluff. I look forward to new life, when it comes I marvel at it and it fills me with so much happy. But there is another side to these little creatures.
Baby animals mean extra work. They are like toddlers full of beans and no idea what we want them to do. Baby animals are often finding ways to escape, just when you thought you have done all the things to keep them in. Then there is trying to move a group with babies in it. I thought I was a pro at moving the animals, we had it down! Alas no, not with babies they seem to go every which way but the way you want them to go. I found myself patting one of our ewes to get her to go only to have her circling me to make sure her lamb was following. I’m sure any real farmer out there would have laughed to see me trying to get those sheep from one paddock to another.
Chicks have been the worst for staying where they’re supposed to be despite all the effort to keep them secure in the run. Ultimately we have to put them in a smaller area till they grow enough to not find the small gaps. Then there are the ducks I’m not sure about them and I wonder how they manage to hatch anything. We had to catch them and kept safe for a few weeks. Ducklings are not smart nor are they nibble. The ducks on the farm don’t seem to brood over their ducklings the way a chicken would. Instead they head off for a while to preen in the sun while those clumsy little fluff balls just waddle around all over the place. Sadly, this has lead to a few loses. That’s the other thing, sometimes they die and that is so sad.
I have even tried raising animals myself and that was even harder. I have tried hatching and raising chicks, and bottle feeding a lamb. The amount of time and commitment raising baby animals (well all babies really) can be intense. Then there is a whole lot of information that needs to be gained. Granted, I did make egg hatching much harder on myself by trying to jimmy rig an incubator but I wasn’t able to purchase one, needs must as they say. After those experiences I have chosen to take my hat off to those mama’s out there. They just know what they’re doing (except those ducks I don’t know what happened there) and it means that my life is not taken over by them only inconvenienced a little. Besides all that time I freed up by letting the mama’s do their job can be spent just watching them.
