Cetti's Warbler - Small bird

I came across this lovely small bird while walking on the isle of Harris, Outer Hebrides, Scotland.

Bambi deer - White tail deers

 I can't remember where exactly these pictures were taken. Somewhere in the South East, in the park of one of these large stately homes.

This little fawn is nearly the size of its mum:

Family pet

Showing you cute pictures of my dog is not easy..
She is really getting on. She is turning 18. She has bits growing in the wrong places, i.e. growths on her eye lids and fatty lumps on her body and around her neck. She is losing her eye sight. She has arthritis in her lower back and she suffers from kidney failure which makes her extra smelly.

The only thing still working for her is an acute sense of smell.

We bought her a new bed recently but, as you can see in the second picture, staying on it is not that easy :-)

Sad - Lamb rejected by its mum, Final Part

The ewe was now lying on a grass. She looked in a very bad way and having been stuck up side down on the rocks for some time certainly made matters worse.

We decided to give the lamb some cow's milk to give it a fighting chance while waiting for the farmer's son to come back from work.

My brother in law's toddler donated one of his bottles so that we could use it to feed the lamb.
We also put some water in a milk bottle to give the ewe something to drink too.

It was nice to see that the lamb really perked up after its.... first..... drink!



Unfortunately, this is how the story ends. We went away afterwards for a couple of hours and when we came back both animals had disappeared. We assumed that the farmer's son came and picked them both up.
We never found out what happened to that cute little lamb. It is possible that they were both disposed of as hand feeding a lamb takes a lot of time and commitment and the ewe was not in a good way.

We will never know but at least, we tried to help a little.....

Sad story - A lamb rejected by mum, Part 5

A couple of hours later, we came back to the spot where we left the ewe and her lamb. The little lamb was lying on the grass, very quietly, but the mum was nowhere to be seen.

We were in for a surprise...

We found her after a few minutes as she was out of sight on lower grounds. Only a few meters away from where we left them both, she was lying on her back, stuck between two large rocks, with her four legs up in the air. Not sure how it happened, but somehow, she managed to fall off the grass verge down about one meter onto these large rocks. Surely, she would not deliberately jump down there!!!

Below are a couple of pictures showing the type of terrain she fell down onto.

She was still alive though. Her legs would make occasional jerky mouvements. Two of the guys moved her slightly to the side so that she would lie in a more confortable position.

We thought of bringing the lamb to her so it could feed. If the ewe were to die, at leat the lamb would have a fighting chance of survival while waiting for the farmer to come back from work!
This was a very unsuccessful attempt. The lamb could not take to her teat and we could not extract any milk by hand either.

So, we decided to move the ewe back on higher grounds so that the farmer could see her from the road. We had to call for reinforcement as the ewe was very heavy. We went to get the other two brothers and the four of them managed to lift the ewe back to a flat part of the grass and the lamb was brought to her.
To be continued...

Sad story - A lamb rejected by its mum, Part 4

The ewe certainly did not want to have anything to do with her lamb.
We were worried our presence (altough we were still at a distance) might disturb the ewe even more so we thought best to leave them be and check up on them later.

It was around midday and, although it is always cold and windy in this part of Scotland, the sun was warm. So, we were hoping the lamb would be fine.


In the video below, you will see a compilation of two clips. One taken shortly after the ewe and the lamb were "reunited" (you can still hear the man's van in the background). The other was taken a few minutes later.

Sad Story - A lamb rejected by its mum, Part 3

Now, back to my story.
We expressed our concern to the man who stopped to help us. We wondered if she might still be in labour but the guy had a quick poke at her tummy and said no.

As all sheep from the same flock carry the same painted marking on their back, it was easy to work out whose farmer the ewe belonged to.
We were told that he lived a couple of miles up the road. So, a couple of us walked to his home to inform him of what had happened.

A really old and frail man answered the door. He said that there was nothing he could do for the ewe and her lamb. He was nearly blind and would not be physically able to take them to the vet... 60 miles up the road... All he could do was wait for his son to come back from work in the evening.

As the ewe and lamb were "reunited".

To be continued...

Sad story - A lamb rejected by its mum, Part 2

Before I go any further in my story, I need to show you what happened shortly after the lamb was born. It really was heart breaking seeing the ewe ignoring her new born lamb as she did.

Sad story - A lamb rejected by its mum Part 1

We went to Harris, in the Outer Hebrides, in June  2011 during the lambing season.
We noticed that one of the ewes wanted to have nothing to do with her new-born lamb.  Seeing the lamb being rejected, we were not sure what to do. So, we caught the attention of a local man driving past in his van and asked if he could help in any way.
He picked up the lamb and placed it right next to the ewe.

To be continued...