our vet, the affable Dr. Mouhli came on Saturday morning. As our animals are registered with the county farm property , an organization that is responsible for ensuring the traceability of livestock, we automatically receive communications from the Departmental Directorates of Veterinary Services . We have appointed a local veterinarian, in our case Mouhli Hamadi, and is also informed by the DDSV what he has to visit farms to carry out checks or vaccinations. We therefore expected the phone call Annick, its secretary, to make an appointment for blood tests (every three years) to detect the presence or absence of brucellosis in our herd and vaccinate our sheep against bluetongue.
order to produce these important vaccines and deployed throughout the country, vials, which should only be used as the day they are open, come in a bulky size of 100 doses. This provides our vet and his secretary to additional logistical task to oppose the large farms with small herds, like ours, to use the most out of each bottle.
With a multi-dose syringe in each hand (to make the annual reminder both serotypes 1 and 8) and counting the glass vials for blood tests as if loaded with cartridges, it had a certain air of Clint Eastwood. Find a vein under a thick coat of wool winter was not the easiest of tasks and Gabrielle and I were amazed how easy it was detached from the wool with his fingers as hard feathers of a hen . It gave him a better chance of hitting the mark with the hypodermic needle. We were wondering if we can try to "pluck" our sheep this May, rather than do the mowing!
At our sheep were officially perforated, we asked if he could tell if Hamadi our sheep were full. They seem to have a width of the season in the stomach. He handled gently down the right side of a sheep, then put my hand in the same position. I'm not sure I felt something specific. Maybe I'll do the same later in the year and see if I can detect the difference between empty and full. He apologizes for not having his physical ultrasound with him, but it's not worth going that far, we were just curious if he could say by putting an expert hand on the belly.
That said, one of our sheep gave us his answer yesterday morning (see photo above). Another boy! In our fourth year with our small herd of little lambs Ushant, we only ever had male lambs. Usually we do not name our little cattle hereby cats do not have a name-but as the first lamb born in 2010 and 14 February, we decided to call it Valentine. He announced the beginning of our lambing.
