A Very Late New Comer!!

Welcome to Darla!

Darla, an Icelandic ewe lamb, was born here Monday afternoon as a result of a unscheduled breeding at Stony Meadows Farm in January/February. I bought her mom, Candice, (pictured with her) uncertain of whether she was pregnant as a yearling.

As you can tell, Darla is teeny tiny! She was most probably born prematurely. Since her mom's milk had not come in, she needed some colostrum. I fed her frozen colostrum from my neighbor's dairy goats for two days. Her mom didn't understand about nursing her lamb, so we had to be a bit forceful with Candice once her milk did come in. Then Candice became a nursing mom.

Now Darla thinks it's time to eat some hay... and she's only 3 days old!!!

Icelandic Sheep have many, many different colors and color patterns. To me it looks like Darla is Mouflon and white spotted. But I haven't learned enough to say for sure. I'll leave it to the experts to determine! One thing's for sure: this breed is born with lots of long curls of fleece!!!

Candice's long fleece has grown since April 8th!

Here are more pictures of total cuteness!!