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 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 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...