by Jon Katz
AT EIGHT, JANE AND I AND ROSE DROVE AROUND THE POND to the small rise where wed seen the sheep. I could see where theyd chewed the bark off trees. I also saw sheep droppings, but not sheep. I parked, let Rose out, then climbed out myself, overoptimistically carrying a rope halter a neighbor had provided. Jane, whose knee still troubled her, stood alongside the car. I scrambled up the slope and sent Rose out to my left. Get the sheep, girl, I yelled, her usual command. Rose sniffed and scanned, then took off. I glimpsed the animals moving in the woods, then turning and running. So much for that. I couldnt see or hear Rose, but after a few minutes, she came exploding out of the woods, barking at me Lassie-style (Cmon, Timmy, this way!), then turning back into the trees. I followed. A short walk ahead, Rose had the ewe and the ram cornered between some downed trees and a length of old stone fence. She was crouched in front of them, barking and lunging every time they tried to flee. Both sheep were in pitiful condition, their wool filthy and matted, their faces too thin. My own Tunis ewes looked fat and sassy by contrast. When I crashed up through the underbrush, the sheep broke out of their trap, vaulting the crumbling fence and dashing off in different directions. The ram turned and butted Rose, bouncing her about ten feet. But when she got up and charged, going for his nose, he backed off, turned, and ran. So Rose swiveled and took off after the ewe, who was heading for the pond. The two battled for nearly half an hour, the ewe trying one path, then another, Rose always in front of her, charging, barking, nipping. The ewe was tiring-as was I-but Rose seemed as unstoppable as the Energizer Bunny. Finally, the ewe broke out of the woods and headed across the ice-covered pond. Rose wasnt about to give up now; she followed the ewe onto the ice and the two slipped and slid around each other. Rose couldnt get a firm purchase, so she coasted around the ewe on her butt-the strangest outrun Id ever seen a border collie make. The scene went on and on, Rose and the ewe running, falling, skidding, the ewe panting but frantic, Rose tireless and focused. My sister and a growing number of neighbors-some popping out of their houses with video cameras-were cheering her on. Even as Rose slid past the scrambling ewe, she nipped at her, managing to keep herself between the ewe and the far side of the pond. I was afraid of falling on or through the ice, so I ran up and down along the bank, shouting praise and encouragement to my puppy. At that moment, I knew that no matter what else happened that day, Rose would get her prey. She would not be deterred. Finally, the ewe gave up, shuffled back across the pond and into the brush. The neighbors were whooping and applauding for Rose. But we still didnt have the ewe. Panicked, she plowed into a snowdrift and stopped momentarily, a bit stunned. I lunged for her and slipped the halter over her neck. The poor ewe, terrified, bucked and charged and tried to escape. When she went down, gasping, Id loosen the halter to make sure she could breathe. Up close, I saw how her eyes were sunk deep into their sockets; how, beneath her unshorn coat, she was skin and bones. When she recovered a bit, she leaped to her feet and began battling all over again, with me pulling on her head and Rose nipping at her behind. The epic struggle lasted another half hour before we finally dragged her, still protesting, into the neighbors corral, complete with a heap of hay. By now, I was so drained I wasnt sure we had strength left for the ram, who was bigger and surely more aggressive. My sister, despite her bad knee, had been following along. She was amazed, she said, at my stamina, as I went scrambling up hills and dragging livestock around. I was amazed myself. We walked from the corral back to where wed begun, and Rose took the issue out of my hands. She roared off into the woods, reappearing five minutes later with an impatient where-the-hell-are-you look, then charging back into the trees. Here we went again. The ram was at least a third larger than his companion, and far more ornery. When he butted Rose right in the head, the crack was terrifying and sent her flying. This, of course, was why rational border collie owners didnt want to risk their dogs. I screamed obscenities at the ram and charged him, waving my shepherds crook. He plowed into my leg, knocking me down. I picked up my stick and whacked him across the nose, and he backed up, startled. Terrified for Rose, I turned to look for her. A black-and-white blur came hurling past me and attached itself to the fleeing rams behind. The Second Battle of Janes Pond was on, far bloodier and nastier than the first. Rose, seemingly unfazed by her head-butting, was furious. She launched one of her boxing-ring rope-a-dopes, bewildering the enraged ram with her fancy footwork, darting, nipping, barking, and growling. The ram, turning this way and that, growing dizzy and disoriented, broke through the woods and into a neighbors yard, startling the chickens and ducks penned in coops. A goof. Now he was hemmed in by the coops and the house. Rose and I came flying down the hillside, me half-sliding on my butt, Rose leaping from stump to snowdrift. The ram charged again, but I got a halter on him. Unlike the ewe, however, the halter barely slowed him down. He dragged me along through a cluster of trash cans, a patch of garden, a pile of firewood. He was pulling me as if I were a twig, but he was gradually losing strength, struggling and reeling a bit. I was bleeding from my nose, and my leg was killing me, but I hung on for dear life. Rose was staying in his face, keeping the pressure on. This struggle was more prolonged. For ill-nourished creatures, these sheep had astonishing strength and energy. It took another hour before we could steer him-wheezing, snorting, gasping-toward the corral, and finally inside. It was such an effort that only days later did I think to ask Jane what would become of the animals. A local farmer would take them, she said. Closing the gate to the pen, I collapsed, and Rose rushed into my arms, happy and proud. She knew she had done something swell, and so did the people applauding her from all over the pond. We took our plaudits, but it was late in the morning. I was exhausted and I faced a long drive. I also wanted to spring Orson from the kennel before it closed for the night. So we drove back to Janes. This was wonderful, she said. Thank you. It was wonderful for me, too, I said. She apologized for not having food or coffee to offer me before I headed home. I have to get used to this guest thing, she said. I hope youll come back, anyway. I said I would, and meant it. We would not, I swore, lose each other again. ALL THE WAY HOME, ROSE RODE SHOTGUN, AND ALL THE WAY I praised her for her companionship, her steadfastness, her courage, and her herding skill. Driving down the New York State Thruway, I asked whatever higher power had brought Jane this far to help her find comfort and happiness. I loved her very much, this strange red-haired woman with her big sweet dogs and her freezer stuffed with poultry. I felt depleted, though, and not just from our protracted sheep roundup. My lost sister, now found, had found herself a loving place, but a place for dogs, about dogs, and dependent on dogs. I couldnt decide whether or not it was a good thing to live like that. I missed Paula every day; I missed having lunch with Emma and arguing about movies. For me, dog love, wonderful as it was, wasnt enough. But what about my sister? Would she be all right? Should I have done more for her, and should I do more now? I wondered if it was okay for her to end up this way-living out her life with and for a herd of loving, sick, and needy Newfoundlands. And heres what I decided: Yes, it was okay, and I needed to accept it. Dogs had done what humans couldnt: theyd brought Jane and me together again. Theyd taken me to that pond and those sheep, a fittingly weird kickoff to our new relationship. Jane had done the best she could. She hadnt wound up in a destructive relationship, in awful health, on pills or alcohol. She was hurting no one, meant no one harm, had devoted herself to making these sweet and soulful creatures happy. I also realized, driving back to what I now instinctively called home, that my own center of gravity had shifted. New Jersey was where Paula was, which made it important. But home was where my farm was, where Jacob and Anthony and my other friends and neighbors were, where Carol and Fanny would be at the hay feeder, braying happily when I pulled into the driveway. Where the sheep would look up in their detached, appraising way to see if I emerged from the truck carrying a bucket. Where Orson and I would climb the hill to see the sunrise. BACK AT THE FARM, I SPOKE WITH MY SISTER EVERY DAY. IT WAS still awkward at times; conversations never w
ent on long without circling back to her dogs. She wanted to know about me, my life and my work, but there were limits. My reports were invariably interrupted by observations about her Newfies. At first, I found this sad, sometimes irritating. Im exhausted, I would tell her after sleepless nights during lambing season. Get some rest, she would reply, and then: Its Charitys first birthday! But over time, I came to terms with it. I usually call her around sundown now, when I can look out my tall living-room window at the barn and the shadows lengthening behind the barn. I always feel grateful, lucky to be surrounded by such beauty, and lucky to be able to talk with my sister again. Part of me still feels I only have a part of my sister back, that I share her with some Newfoundlands. But so what? For some people, dogs and other animals are the only beings they can trust. Dogs show them its okay to love again, no matter the trauma or mistreatment they have suffered. Sometimes, dogs lead the way back. But even when they dont, it isnt my place to make judgments about these peoples choices. Jane was happy and at peace. Her home was an oasis of calm and affection. If dogs had brought that about, then good for them.
Chapter Eleven
LAMBING SEASON AT ABOUT FOUR A.M. ON MARCH 3, ROSE AND I STOOD A BIT uncertainly, looking up at the small paddock behind the barn. Ewe number 57-that was the number on her tag, and except for the shaggy Paula and old Minnie, Id given the sheep no other names-was in labor. She was stomping the ground, circling, panting. Lambing season was officially under way. Id never developed much love for these sheep, but Id worked hard to take the best possible care of them. It was a bit presumptuous, probably. Lots of people could train dogs better than I could; sheep farmers knew vastly more about sheep and lambing; anyone whod lived here a few years knew more about winter. But plain old determination is underrated; it can take you far. It had brought me through five strange and challenging months to this very disquieting night. I was now responsible for multiple ruminant lives, and my goal was to have uniformly healthy, well-cared-for lambs; I didnt want to lose a single one. It was beautiful but cold, twenty-two below and windy, according to my all-weather radio channel. Shepherds dont like icy gusts when lambs are born. I found myself staring into the paddock every few minutes, eager to get mother and baby into the safety of the barn as quickly as possible after the birth. Apart from our one agitated ewe, the paddock was eerily quiet. Rose and the flock were rarely as calm together as they were tonight. The ewes we usually shuttled around were lying down, untroubled and still. Rose wasnt harassing them, and they seemed curiously unbothered by her. All the creatures in the paddock-me, Rose, the sheep-had wordlessly agreed to suspend our normal behavior. Lambing purists probably would have been horrified, and maybe border collie snobs, too, but Id decided Rose should be present for every birth. I couldnt trust Orson around tiny lambs-hed be thinking snacks-but with Rose, I had a chance to experiment. I wanted her to see the lambs join our little encampment, rather than simply encounter them one morning in the pasture. I wanted her to be comfortable around them and to see them as creatures under her care. Her job description was about to change radically; so was mine. Id brought a high-powered flashlight outside with me, along with a sling that my friend Joanne Smith had given me for toting newborns, a set of surgical gloves, scissors, a bottle of iodine, a tube of lubricant, and a towel. Plus-to keep the lamb midwife going-a granola bar and a mug of tea. The ewe was moaning and tossing her head. I saw the fluid sac emerge, then burst. The birth should follow in a couple of hours. I was shivering with cold, but mesmerized by her struggle. After a while, she lay down on her side, groaned and pushed, her tail up. I didnt want to get too close, but Rose crept up, sniffed the ewes face, gave her a quick lick, and then came back to me. The ewe, who normally moved away from Rose on sight, didnt budge. Rose had never seen lambing before; I wondered which old border collie instinct was being awakened. I, on the other hand, had seen several lambs born while helping Carolyn during previous lambing seasons in Pennsylvania. But those werent my sheep. This was different. Rose seemed hypnotized, sitting perfectly still, taking in this strange behavior. We kept watch for nearly two hours, pacing a bit to try to keep warm. I didnt want to miss the first birth, but as dawn approached, I was growing numb with cold. Remembering my frostbite and the doctors hypothermia warnings, I decided to put on additional layers of clothing. I took Rose inside the house, fed her and Orson, and made myself a pot of coffee. This was something Orson really couldnt be part of, so after breakfast I gave him a pat and tucked him safely away. I tried to warm my hands. Then, in my Michelin Man outfit of multiple layers of clothing and long underwear, I headed back out with Rose. Life at the farm had become a series of scheduled shocks: I knew certain challenges were approaching, but when they arrived-sheep, donkeys, winter, lambs-bedlam followed anyway. Theres a difference between conceptualizing something and living it. Amanda Alderink and Kirk Ayling from the Granville vet service had each delivered lectures on lamb care during their unnervingly frequent visits to care for Carol and the flock. They explained how to spot trouble during labor, how the fetus should be positioned, how to reach in and pull it out if necessary, how to trim the wool around the udders so that the babies could reach them, how to keep the mothers and lambs strong. I joked weakly that Id probably just phone one of them instead, but the vets reminded me that Id be the one out there in the pasture in the dark (invariably) and that sometimes birth moved fast and got ugly. So Amanda and Kirk both spoke slowly and repeated their instructions several times, perhaps noticing the look of growing alarm on my face. Besides listening to the vets lectures, Id also trawled websites, ordered pamphlets and books, and talked to a half-dozen sheep farmers. Joanne Smith, whod been through this several times and whose advice was rock solid, warned me that I was in for a rougher ride than I imagined. On one level, I was certainly ready. I had ordered supplements called sheeps first milk and milk replacement, plus vitamins and penicillin, worming medication, tubes, and syringes; Id collected basins, buckets, and towels. Joannes sling would allow me to carry a newborn while slowly walking backward, to lead a new mother into the barn. Id bought implements Id never heard of before, notably a pig castrator to dock the lambs tails (for sanitary, not aesthetic, reasons), taggers, and ear tags to identify the lambs and ewes. I had molasses ready to mix with warm water to recharge famished mothers after delivery. My kitchen looked like a hospital triage station, covered with bottles and nipples, medications and needles. Inside the creaky old barn, wed rigged up a series of lights and lamps and enclosures. Anthony had installed a green swinging gate to divide the space and keep the donkeys apart, enhanced the electrical power to the barn, and built plywood pens with sliding wooden entrances. He checked in several times a day, usually leaving a message that said, in its entirety, Yo! You alive? Joanne and Ray had lent me a more elegant enamel lambing pen. The new electrical outlets allowed for giant tubs of heated water, so that the exhausted moms wouldnt face frozen buckets, and heat lamps to keep newborns warm during their critical first few hours. There were bales of straw for bedding and hay for food tucked everywhere. But if I felt ready on a practical level, I was in every other way unprepared. Lambing seemed an enormous undertaking. I was already wearied by the long winter and the simple but endless chores of farm life. Now everything was about to get more complex; even sleeping in a warm bed for more than a few hours at a stretch seemed hard to manage. The specter of dead ewes or dying lambs haunted me. All sorts of things could happen out there, with nobody to come to your rescue at two A.M. Besides, I didnt really want to call a vet every time there was trouble, tempting though that was. I wanted to handle lambing season myself, if I could. This post-midnight visit to the pasture, now a nightly routine, wasnt about having a mystical experience; it was necessary. When Id set up Bedlam Farm, I imagined I would grow restless and bored after five or six months, anxious to spend more time back in New Jersey or begin working on another project. So Id decided to breed the sheep right away, ensuring births in early March. Not grasping the implications, or imagining the severity
of the winter, I had brought Nesbitt in early to do his stuff. As it turned out, I was never either restless or bored, not for a second. The winter had been difficult, but exhilarating. I had expected to move on, but now could hardly imagine life away. Nevertheless, I was lambing at this time of the year, which meant that the complexity and dangers had increased dramatically. Lambs, like other mammals, are born slippery and wet, covered in fluids. And my flock was lambing in one of the most brutal winters in recent history. A newborn could freeze to the ground in minutes. Those first moments are crucial in many ways. The mother not only tries to make her baby warm and dry by licking it (gaining some important nutrients for herself in the process), but thats how she understands the lamb is hers-she bonds with it by its smell and its sound. After a couple of days in a pen, lambs and ewes will not forget that they belong together. Outside the barn, that can make the difference between warmth and freezing, protectiveness and rejection, nourishment and starvation, a grisly encounter with a predator or a safe spot in the herd. A lot of things can do in a tiny lamb. My geography didnt help. In the cold and dark, with ewes milling around a fairly large sloping pasture, a newborn could easily get separated from its mother. After just a few minutes apart, she was likely to reject her lamb, who would then either starve or require risky and less healthy bottle feeding. Ewes, I was told, varied wildly as to mothering. Some were attentive and diligent, others flighty and quick to abandon their offspring. So there were all sorts of reasons I needed to be on hand tonight: to make sure the birth went smoothly, to intervene if necessary, to keep the ewe and lamb together, to get the lamb into a sling as quickly as possible. Then, walking backward with the lamb in my arms, slowly so that the ewe wouldnt lose her lambs scent, Id bring them both into the barn, into a pen and under a heat lamp. It would be no small feat, especially in sub-zero temperatures. Many farmers lamb in barns, but my hardy Tunis sheep had never developed a taste for barns. In fact, theyd bust through doors trying to get out. Even when the wind chill reached minus fifty one January night, the ewes sat huddled together at the top of the hill, exposed to the cold and the wind. Id put grain and hay in the barn to tempt them down, but they showed little interest. Besides, even my spacious old barn didnt have enough space for more than a few ewes in labor. There was really no other way: they had to be, and wanted to be, outside, so I had to be with them. Carr and some of my other neighbors ridiculed my worries about these lambs: Let nature take its course. Theyll take care of themselves. Theyve been doing this for hundreds of years. You might lose a few, but thats natures way. It wasnt my way. I had strong feelings about keeping faith with creatures under my care. If lambs died under circumstances I could have prevented, it was on my head, not natures. BACK IN THE PADDOCK, ROSE STIFFENED, THEN TORE UP THE slope and picked something up off the ground. I recognized it: the afterbirth, part of it on the ground, some still smeared on the ewe, who was licking a tiny brown lamb. Our first. I wanted to rush over for a closer look, but I held Rose back in a lie-down and waited for ten anxious minutes. When I thought the baby was mostly dry, I released Rose, who trotted over and gently sniffed the wobbly little creature. The mother got nervous, and I was about to take Rose out of the paddock, but remembering my ideas about trusting this dog, I let her stay. She sat fifteen feet away, so still I almost forgot she was there. I was excited. Lambs are intrinsically cute, and this one-I named it Jane-was adorable. But I was more surprised and impressed by the mother. Id sometimes written off my sheep as a bunch of crowd-following grazers, but this mom was impressive, keeping a wary eye on me and on Rose, alert for any danger. She made an affectionate clucking sound I hadnt heard before as she methodically licked every inch of Jane. I approached slowly, carefully picked up the shivering lamb, and placed her in the sling. She was still slippery, and it was difficult to position her hooves properly, even harder to get her to hold still. But I held her in front of her mama and began walking backward down the muddy slope. I had to leave the flashlight behind, so I was feeling my way in the moonlight. The ewe followed me down the slope, around some trees, alongside the artesian well. It took a while for our little procession to reach safety. Whenever the ewe wandered or strayed-she lost track of her lamb several times-I had to clamber back up and hold the sling in front of her nose. When we finally got to the barn, I set the lamb in a stall, slipped off the sling, slid down the gate, and turned on the heat lamp. I gave the pair a clump of hay (called a leaf) and a bucket of fresh water, which the ewe drank hungrily, alternating gulps between lamb-cleaning. I got my special scissors, held the lamb up-the mother circled in alarm-and snipped the umbilical cord, then sprayed the spot with disinfectant. Rose had slipped in quietly to watch; the ewe didnt seem to mind. Jane had tightly curled fleece in a warm cinnamon color that would fade to cream with age, and a white blaze on her head. She had a high-pitched bleat that, to her mother, would always distinguish her from the others. And she quickly found a teat and began nursing, her tail wiggling frantically-a sign that milk was being consumed. This wasnt so bad. Rose and I were both transfixed-but also weary. We left the pair in the barn and went inside to rest up for the next round. I CHECKED THE PADDOCK SEVERAL TIMES A DAY, BUT THE weather was so cold-nights still in the single digits and wind chills below zero, even in mid-March-that I set my alarm clock to ring every two or three hours during the night as well. I kept my jeans and jacket and boots by the bed so I could yank them on fast and dash out on patrol with Rose and a flashlight. I soon came to understand the concept of sleep deprivation as torture. In the daytime I became useless-irritable, exhausted, grimy. After the first few nights I simply slept in my clothes, like a fireman; all I had to do was pull on my boots. The next birth was more complicated. I came into the paddock early one morning-werent any of these ewes going to deliver in daylight?-and noticed a ewe near the fence, obviously in labor. She stomped and groaned until 5:30, but this time, I wasnt about to miss the moment of birth. I saw her water break, bursting from the dangling sac, followed by a gooey brown mass that slid to the ground, coughed, and started to move. I saw that membranes covered the lambs mouth and, using my plastic surgical gloves, wiped them away. The lamb gurgled, baahed, and struggled to its feet; the mother began licking. That was when I messed up. I went into the house to fetch my birthing supplies. It took no more than ten minutes-my fingers were so numb, I held them above the toaster oven to try to regain some feeling-before we returned to the paddock. I climbed the hill, waited a few more minutes for the ewe to finish her licking, then maneuvered the baby into the sling. This was a diligent mother, but she seemed to lose her bearings easily. We went back and forth on the hill for what seemed forever, though it probably was no more than fifteen minutes. I called for help from Rose, who circled behind the ewe to get her moving. That focused her on the lamb, and the four of us found our way quickly into the barn and into the second stall. In the other one, Jane and her mom were thriving. After cutting the cord and making sure the new pair had hay and water and heat, I went back into the paddock for a final look around before going back to bed. I was cold and sore-lambing was hard on my leg-and it was a long climb up to bed. My heart lurched. Another lamb, clearly newborn, since it was tiny and wet, was bleating at a ewe that didnt seem to mind or chase it away, but wasnt being attentive, either. She wasnt licking the baby, which made me suspicious. I shined my flashlight around and saw no traces of afterbirth. When I walked closer, the ewe simply moved away. For a new mother, she was awfully diffident. Then it struck me: this was a twin. When Id gone into the house for supplies, the ewe had given birth to another lamb. When I came back to the paddock and carried her firstborn away, shed followed me, and wed left this baby behind. Or perhaps it had simply wandered off, beyond the mothers attention. I could see no other ewe in labor. This had to be a twin, and it was cold and alone, and therefore in trouble. I was running out of time. I wrapped the lamb in a towel and with my other hand grabbed a handful of the afterbirth still on the ground; sometimes if you smeared it on the lamb the mother would connect w
ith it. I rushed to the barn, sliding, falling once but keeping the lamb and afterbirth up out of the muck. Freezing, covered in mud and other stuff, I rushed into the barn and put the lamb into the pen. I took the first twin out so that the ewe would concentrate on this new one. But she immediately butted the baby right into the pen wall, then charged at him again. Maybe if we tried Joannes fancy blue lambing pen: it had a separate compartment where newborns could go to be safe. I put both babies inside, then the ewe; she kept butting the second twin with great force whenever she could. The baby looked miserable, battered; he retreated into a corner just out of reach and lay down, shivering, while the other lamb crawled out and began nursing. I tried smearing afterbirth on twin number two, pulling first one lamb and then the other out of the pen, so that the second baby could nurse and ignite the connection. Nothing helped. For two hours the ewe rejected her baby, until I realized this wasnt going to work. I named the poor guy Arthur and left him in his safe corner. I went into the kitchen, got out my lamb survival supplies, and called the vet while mixing up some milk replacement in a baby bottle. When I came back into the barn Arthur had given up on his mom and was huddled forlornly. He loved the bottle instantly. I pulled out the lawn chair Id bought the day before at the Salem Hardware Store, realizing Id never survive standing for hours every night. I put a towel in my lap and sat down with Arthur and the bottle. He drank greedily. It is impossible, I suspect, for anyone who loves animals not to bond with a newborn lamb thats curled up against you, drawing sustenance from the bottle youre giving him. I could feel Arthurs heart thumping as he gulped. I told him how sorry I was that Id screwed up his first hours and promised to take care of him. In the morning Dr. Amanda came from Granville-wed gotten to know each other well by now-and said the mother and twins were doing fine. Arthur was thin, but if he was taking the bottle, he might make it. He would have a rough time when he was released into the flock; the other mothers would butt and kick him. He would survive, if he could, by grabbing the occasional passing nipple and learning to eat grass and grain early. Without real mothers milk, he might never be as robust and disease-resistant as the others, but he had a decent shot. Arthur thinks you are his mom, the vet told me. And, true, he baahed furiously at the sight of me. But the lamb was nothing like a puppy, able to drowse in his humans presence. He was all instinct and drive, all about food, battling relentlessly for every drop of milk. It was curious to see the instincts nature gave these creatures to help them survive. Every three or four hours Rose and I came out into the barn and I sat down in the chair with Arthur while he scarfed down half a bottle. I usually also brought a cup or two of oats for Carol and Fanny, who were getting fewer snacks and less attention than normal but accepted lambing season with their usual equanimity. Those cold nights in the pasture were considerably warmer for the presence of Carol or Fanny, who stood alongside me, nudging my pocket for cookies or presenting their heads for scratching. They took in the lambing drama the way they took in everything, with their soulful eyes and calm manners. The morning after Arthurs birth, the sheep named Paula was standing matter-of-factly in the pasture at five A.M. with a big brown bruiser of a newborn ram alongside her. Shed handled the whole business efficiently in the few hours since Id last checked. Her lamb, twice the size of the others, ran right up to me and Rose. I named him Brutus. Paula, like her namesake, was a great mom, attentive and affectionate. I wished my own Paula were here, but shed been traveling for work and wasnt scheduled to arrive for another week. Meanwhile the house was a shambles, dirty dishes piling up in the sink, syringes and bottles all over the kitchen and pantry, dust and caked dirt and sprigs of hay all over the floor. Id had no time for laundry or shopping and was wolfing down frozen dinners, stale bread, and an occasional apple or slice of cheese. The lambs were eating more nutritiously than I was. By the second day of nursing, Arthur and I had bonded. He was a fighter; his determination was appealing. I kept him near his mother in case she had a change of heart, and he had grown adept at darting into her pen, trying to grab a drink, then retreating into his safe corner. He looked miserable whenever the ewe butted him, and watched silently as his sister nursed. But I thought he was gaining weight. Tired as I was, I looked forward to pulling the lawn chair out, sitting with the lamb on my lap, donkeys hovering nearby and Rose sniffing around. A few times I brought Orson out on a leash to inspect the new arrivals. I didnt especially like the way he eyed the lambs, particularly defenseless Arthur, but it was neat to have him be part of the season. Rose was growing more comfortable by the day with our expanding cadre of lambs, but a new problem had arisen. The same ewes shed been happily pushing around for months had suddenly become monsters, hissing, kicking, and butting whenever she came near. Rose was shocked, yelping in surprise and retreating. Conventional herding-dog wisdom dictated that she shouldnt be there at all, but she was my partner in all things sheep. I watched in fascination as she sat next to me and studied these newly aggressive creatures as they ate and nursed. I had no doubt she would approach the matter with the same resolve and ingenuity that she brought to the rest of her work, but for now, she was stymied. That was fine; it wouldnt hurt for her to respect her charges a bit more. On the third night, I saw Arthur weaken a bit. He was cold, shivering; he didnt baah when I entered the barn. At a shepherd friends suggestion, Id tried smearing the afterbirth from another ewe on him and tried to slip him in with her as a fake twin. That didnt work. I tried him with Paula and her brute in the lambing pen; she rammed him full force against the plywood wall. So I put him back with his mom, cursing her indifference and my own carelessness. The next day, I came outside at six A.M. with Arthurs morning bottle. He was subdued, but gamely took two or three gulps of milk. Then, as I held him, I actually felt his heart stop. His head tilted off to one side. Id lost him. I could hear my neighbors voices: Its part of it. And they were right: if you were going to have lambs, whatever your resolve, you were going to lose some. It was as intrinsic to the experience as cooing over them as they gamboled about. But I was surprised and sad. If Id been thinking more clearly, I might have been able to connect Arthur and his mother sooner, given him more of a chance. I admired his spirit, but Id helped doom him. Anthony, who had no time for Boomer guilt, came by in the afternoon to take his small body away; the ground was still too hard for a burial, and the possibility of coyotes being drawn down from the woods would have imperiled the rest of the flock. I had changed somewhat in my relationship to animals, I realized. Even my piddling effort at farming had forced me into actions and decisions I wouldnt have thought myself capable of-shooting a feral cat, killing a ewe, messing around with sheep placentas in the middle of a freezing night. Life and death seemed close. The welfare of the farm and the herd came first; any individual creatures were subordinate to that. Id been pulling for Arthur, but he wasnt a companion in the sense that Rose or Orson were. He was something different, somewhere between a pet and a wild animal. His loss meant that Id already, through my own dumb mistake, failed in my goal of keeping all my ewes and lambs alive. But I didnt have the time or inclination to make too much of it. There were too many other lambs arriving, too many other demands. THE NEXT FEW WEEKS WERE HIGH-VOLTAGE BEDLAM: COLD, wet, late snow, sleeplessness, fatigue, long labors. The thrashes and moans of a laboring ewe could now wake me-like any parent-from a sound sleep. I got used to popping out of bed, into my boots, and scrambling out to the paddock. Mostly, I then stood by for hours with my coffee, stomping my numbed feet, watching while the ewes pawed and struggled, waiting for the lamb (or two; we had multiple multiples) to emerge. The slimy blobs slid to the ground, then suddenly moved and stood, fighting from the first for milk. Good moms started a meticulous and careful licking, nuzzling their babies, helping them find the teats. Bad moms seemed schizzy from the beginning, losing focus, getting their babies confused with others, sometimes running back and forth. After theyd bonded, I carried the babies into the barn, the ewes following me, Rose following them. Id cut the umbilical cord, spray iodine on the wound, giv
e an oral vitamin supplement and a shot of Bo-Se vitamin booster. After forty-eight hours, Id tag the baby, then remove most of its tail with the pig castrator, a distasteful but necessary process. For the first four or five days, I managed to keep careful records, noting the time of birth, sex, tag numbers, and the ewes maternal skills. But my ballpoint pens kept freezing; my fingers stopped working; and after a few too many late-night labors, my system fell apart. Paula (the human one), who has as much passion for order as I have a gift for bedlam, said shed help sort it all out when she came up. Though all the births involved hours of sleeplessness, most of them were fairly routine, especially after the first few, and most of the moms diligent. When labors grew too long or rough, I put on my surgical gloves, applied the lube, reached in, and pulled the lamb out, careful to make sure that the hooves and head emerged together. Something that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago was now just another day in Bedlam. Each time I midwifed, my confidence grew. I knew by now what a birth sac felt like; I could grope around to feel the hooves and head and position them properly while the ewe pushed and I pulled. I vaguely remembered our own nurse-midwife telling my wife to do much the same thing when Emma was born. I came to appreciate women even more. Push, push! I found myself urging the ewes. One lambs head got stuck in the birth canal, and it took me nearly an hour to maneuver it out. I was sure the lamb would be dead, but it sprang to life right after it hit the ground. By now the lambing pens were full, and I had to cram a mother and baby into a barn corner with a pile of straw or kick a comfortable mom and baby out into the cruel world a bit early. I found this cycle-birth, nesting, nurturing, reentering the life of the herd-fascinating, even reassuring, but also relentless. Even when we hit a lull, I had little time left after moving heat lamps, mucking out used pens, replacing frozen buckets of water, providing fresh hay to exhausted mothers. The pile of used gloves, syringes, and stained towels mounted. The rest of the world receded; writing became a distant memory; so did casual phone calls, opened mail, cooking, and routine chores. I talked to Paula and Emma in hurried snatches. Nature, I came to see, didnt really take its course all that reliably; she needed backup from me, vets, and various other helpers. My farmer neighbors stopped by, joking at my anxiety, scratching their heads at all the heated tubs and Joannes beautiful enamel pen. They thought I was crazy, but I was also proud to have their grudging respect. Ill say one thing for you, said Carr, returned from Florida a couple of weeks earlier than he should have, when he came by one morning to find me injecting vitamins into a lambs shoulder. You keep your animals well. It was one of the nicest compliments Id ever heard, and from one of the toughest sources. Two of the ewes had vaginal prolapses, a serious, life-threatening and evidently very uncomfortable condition that required one of the vets to insert and attach a plastic retainer. Nobody liked this procedure-not Amanda or Kirk, certainly not the unhappy ewe, and not me, the writer of checks. One of the ewes with a prolapse was one of the few I felt any attachment to. This was Minnie, Carolyns oldest ewe and one of the first sheep my dogs and I had ever worked with. Minnie was such a herding veteran that if I yelled come bye, shed head in the right direction even if the dog didnt. And she was one of the very few ewes who seemed to appreciate human contact and sometimes came up to me for nose scratching and a handful of corn. I had seen her go into labor in the middle of the night, but no baby came out; after six or seven hours, I called the vet. Dr. Amanda had to insert a retainer. I worried about Minnie, even so; she didnt smell quite right and seemed intensely uncomfortable. Rose-following the invisible signals of the animal world-ignored her. Perhaps she sensed that Minnie was sick and was responding with some sort of border collie Geneva Convention. Nesbitt, bless his nasty soul, had done his job well. After two tumultuous weeks, I had nineteen lambs from fourteen ewes. And then there was Minnie, still expecting. She was wide as a barn, her udders hanging nearly to the ground. She would be the last to give birth, and everyone-me, farmers, vets-thought the fetus was likely to die within her, if it hadnt already. One vet suggested a cesarean section, something I was reluctant to put her, and all of us, through. Various neighbors offered to put her out of her misery, Hebron-style. I decided to wait it out. I put her in a barn stall and kept tabs on her, bringing her hay and water. She was trying hard, unable to settle down; she was also old, in bad shape, and smelling worse by the day. We couldnt let this go on indefinitely. The night before had been an all-nighter. A ewe gave birth to twins and, not wanting to repeat the mistake Id made with Arthur, Id hovered over her for every minute of her labor and birth, then picked both lambs up carefully, walking them backward into their pens. The surviving lambs, tagged and docked, were already frolicking with one another, hopping on and off hay bales, and nursing-and managing to dart through tiny gaps between and under fences. Unlike their elders, they had lively personalities, and they seemed to grow bigger and more confident by the day. I wanted no further losses due to my stupidity. By the end of the week I was wrecked, and quite willing to leave things to nature, as everyone advised. But I couldnt go to bed without checking on Minnie one more time, so I left Orson sleeping by the woodstove, called Rose, grabbed my lambing bucket and gloves, and slogged out to the barn. Winter was in its final days but was going out hard. The back-door thermometer said fifteen degrees, downright tropical, but there was a sharp wind, bad conditions for newborns if we had any more. I was expecting a stillbirth. Entering the barn, I could see that something was wrong. The wooden gate to Minnies stall had been split in two, evidently after some intense thrashing. In front of it, Minnie lay on her back, feet in the air, swollen udders hanging to one side. She was lifeless, cold and stiff. Goodbye, girl, I said as Rose sniffed at her body. You were a sweetie. It seemed unfair that one of the few ewes I knew and liked had gone this way. But to be honest, I was too tired to feel very much. In the way even a small farm demands, I had already moved into the gritty, practical phase: How far can I drag Minnies heavy body? Where should I take it? It would be hours before I could call Anthony to move her to his father-in-laws farm, with its dead-animal pile. Kirk Ayling, the vet whod stopped by to see Minnie just that morning, had told me that if anything looked wrong, I should put on gloves. Go in there and pull anything you can feel out, he instructed. This is part of it, I thought for the umpteenth time. If you want to have a farm with sheep and donkeys, youre going to put your hands in some previously unimaginable places. So I did. The cavity was warm and filled with fluids, some of which-smelling foul and infected-came gushing out. I felt a sac, which I grabbed and pushed back, trying to align the head and hooves as Id been told. I pulled gently but firmly for several minutes until a gelatinous blob came out, looking nothing like a lamb. It plopped, motionless, to the barn floor. The odor made me gag. As I turned to grab a towel and wipe my hands, the blob suddenly moved and coughed. A brown lamb with a white forelock was shaking itself off, struggling to its feet, searching for its mother. I was stunned. If the baby were alive, I wondered, could Minnie really be dead? This was a case for Anthonys Three Steps. I grabbed the lifeless Minnie and rolled her over, pushing her to her rigid feet. Upright, she shook her head and began searching anxiously for her lamb. Too startled to kick into gear-cut cord, apply iodine, switch on heat lamp-I noticed after a few moments that Id been staring and muttering, Oh my God. Oh my God, for too long. Because it was a bit Godlike, watching that lamb clamber to its feet, alive because of me. Minnie was licking her tiny offspring frantically, trying to clean it and warm it up. The baby, a female, could barely walk but was fighting to get to her mothers teat. Could it possibly survive? Would Minnie? I made sure the lamb was breathing and getting cleaned off, rushed into the house, washed my hands, put out an SOS to the Granville vet. I was elated to think that if my foolishness had cost the life of one early lamb, my experience might have saved another. I was also afraid, as I waited to hear Kirks truck in the driveway, that mother and perhaps baby were too sick to survive. Kirk would probably have been amazed to know just how happy I was to see h
im. He was as shocked at Minnies resurrection and delivery as I was. On the way over, I was thinking about a C-section, he said, wondering if youd go for that to try and save the baby. Then, oddly, we looked at each other and, without any prompting, said the same thing at the same time: Where is the afterbirth? If there was no placenta, it had to still be inside. There must be another lamb, said Kirk. I asked him to try to pull it out, but he smiled and shook his head. No, you do it, he said. Reluctantly, fearing I might harm the remaining twin, I gloved up and reached in. I wasnt sure what I was feeling, so Kirk felt around and positioned the fetus. I pulled and pulled and out came a ram, Leo, to join the female I decided to call Gert. Kirk and I spent a half hour settling Minnie down, cleaning her up and tending to her twins. Then we shook hands and I thanked him for his encouragement. That was awesome, I said, and it was. I could hardly believe that people like these large-animal vets existed any longer in contemporary, liability-obsessed American society. On call almost all the time, they rushed from farm to farm over long distances in dreadful weather, often working with people who had little money for animal health care. They pulled colts out of horses and calves out of cows, got bitten by pigs and kicked by donkeys. They worked in open spaces, mud, and manure. They made educated guesses, improvised, innovated; they made do with what they had. They were amazing. I felt pretty amazed myself. A ewe I had given up for dead was alive and nursing two small but healthy twins. Kirk said Minnie had developed a vaginal infection-hence the odor-and gave me penicillin and syringes. Shed need shots twice a day. Still, my lambing season was over, or so I thought. The next day I would dismantle the other pens, put away the heat lamps, muck out the barn, and try to return to my real work-writing. I felt tired, exhilarated, and vaguely triumphant. I had lost a lamb but brought many healthy ones into the world. One lamb, Murphy, had been shipped off to Anthonys because its mother seemed to have no milk. Murphy was thriving on bottled sheeps milk, but having him join two large dogs and a toddler proved a strain on an already clamorous household, so Murphy moved on to a shepherd and spinner friend, Sheila. A couple of volunteers, including Jacob, had helped with barn chores and hay hauling. Even with two prolapses, wed gotten through, with the help of some good friends and a couple of great dogs. MY RELIEF WAS, OF COURSE, PREMATURE. THE ENSUING WEEKS just brought a different kind of chaos. Lambing season, it seems, is not over when the last of the lambs are born. Apart from all the medical care and maintenance, a whole new set of crises can erupt. A third ewe had a prolapse, requiring another vet visit, more stitching, another bill. Minnies twins didnt gain weight the way their peers did. Maybe her milk was insufficient or poor quality; in any case, I had to resume bottle feeding. Leo attached himself to me, while Gert hung out with the donkeys. Visitors found this cute, but it was poor animal husbandry, dangerous to the lambs. The only protection sheep have is the impression of bulk they make when they flock together; otherwise they are defenseless. Predators look for sheep wandering off alone, as Gert and Leo had taken to doing. Border collies really dont like to see sheep traveling solo, away from the herd, either. It made Rose and Orson crazy to see individual lambs roaming around. Rose already had her problems with this reconfigured bunch. The lambs were too small and inexperienced to respond to her herding attempts, and the once-docile ewes were still morphing into rampaging beasts when she approached their young. Her pasture became a battleground. Several times, as she was charged, kicked, or butted, Rose yelped and ran behind me, frightened and confused. In one way, my gamble had paid off: Rose, having attended all their births, was very tender toward the lambs, even as their mothers continued to chase her across the paddock. But she struggled with the problem of how to work with this complex mix. Sometimes she tried herding Fanny rather than take on the ewes. The lambs didnt understand what Rose wanted them to do, and the mothers stuck with their offspring, so herding became virtually impossible, especially for a young dog who was still learning. Rose tried all her moves, but she got run off time after time. Resilient and determined, she was also failing for the first time; I saw some signs of stress and hesitation. Perhaps it was time to recognize our limits and pull back. The problem was, Id never needed her more. Id already found lambs outside the pasture several times; they could slither between fenceposts and under gates. Meanwhile vets were roaring in and out of the driveway several times a week and would soon want to castrate the young rams. The farrier would arrive shortly for hoof maintenance, followed in a couple of weeks by the shearer, ready to relieve the ewes of their shaggy, matted fleece. I also had to administer various medications. I needed to move this unruly mob around. So I turned to my secret weapon. Orson had been around sheep for years, and if he was too excitable to herd in the approved way, I had nevertheless been working with him every single day throughout the winter. Id set up our training sessions so that he could not fail, locking the sheep in the small training pen and simply sending him around its perimeter one way or the other, using the come bye and away to me commands. Usually, he spun himself around a few times, then tore toward the pen, raced around the fence with his beautiful lope, and came roaring back to me for a treat. The sheep, nervously watching as he galloped past with that wild gleam in his eyes, were probably grateful for the fence. It wasnt herding, exactly, but wed worked hard on it. Now, I owed Rose a break while the lambs grew up. Why not see whether Orson could dog-break my suddenly unruly herd? We had done that for farmers in New York and Vermont, for ten dollars or a couple of pies. Why not do it for ourselves? On a blustery afternoon, holding my breath, I walked into the pasture with my complex and excitable soulmate. The sight of all the lambs hopping around surprised Orson; he stopped and stared. But he didnt stop for long. The ewes whod rushed up to challenge Rose had grown bolder of late. But the first ewe who challenged Orson got a nip in the butt, followed by a tug at her shaggy fleece that pulled her over onto her side. This only had to happen once. The ewe was unhurt but rattled, and after that, at the mere sight of Orson, the ewes all bleated urgently and nosed their lambs toward the training pen and swiftly inside. Orson wasnt subtle-no inspiring interplay between human and dog, no graceful minuet between dog and sheep-but he did the job. When the vets came or I needed to administer shots, I just opened the pasture gate and let Orson in. In seconds, no matter where theyd been, the whole flock was either inside the pen or huddled in the barn, whichever was closest. This deference, I quickly discovered, also helped Rose. Orson was teaching the sheep and lambs to respect a dog; Rose, challenging the ewes calmly but firmly, was the dog who needed their respect. I noticed the butting and charging becoming less frequent, Rose growing more confident. I praised Orson relentlessly. If he couldnt yet herd like a true border collie, he could help the process along. AFTER ANOTHER WEEK OF NASTY WEATHER THAT SENT ME scampering out to the barn with heat lamps and hay at night, the winter at long last softened its grip on the farm. On March 20, the day after the last lamb was born, Paula showed up, joking about her exquisite timing. Shed be here for a week, during her semester break, and Ive rarely been happier to see anybody. Like me, Paula has never been particularly skilled in the domestic arts; unlike me, she is superbly well organized. In a day or so, the house looked like humans occupied it. I was eating home-cooked (or, at least, defrosted) meals, wore clothes that had been washed and dried. She prepared a Paula-like census of all the ewes and lambs, listing every relevant detail from birth date to quality of mothering. She trekked out to the barn to brush and feed Carol and Fanny, a bit neglected of late. She even helped hold a stricken ewe when Dr. Amanda had to correct another prolapse. Paulas very presence cheered me up and helped me believe in the possibility of spring. It was a joy to see her settle into the roomy old farmhouse between chores, camping in front of the woodstove, transcribing her taped interviews and editing her students papers. By midweek, spring did in fact arrive. The temperature rose into the fifties and I felt comfortable outside for the first time in months. My frostbitten fingers stopped aching; the ice pack around the house and barns was receding;
the mud began to dry. Paula reintroduced the notion, after my weeks of wolfing down bread on the way out to the barn, of the civilized breakfast. She cleared the syringes and lambing supplies from the kitchen table. It was a pleasure to spend a little time chatting over our coffee, looking out the kitchen window at the ewes and lambs moseying through the pasture, framed by a donkey or two. As March rushed by and Paula returned to New Jersey and her work, things began to quiet. I got to sleep through the night. The lambing crises became less frequent. I did, to my real sorrow, lose Minnie and her twins. Weakened by age and infection, pregnancy and delivery, she stopped eating. I tried to tempt her with grain, but she seemed to have lost interest. I was sad but not shocked to find her dead in the barn one morning, and this time, I couldnt revive her. Gert and Leo, never very hardy despite my supplemental bottles, didnt survive her for long. It was a grim warning against feeling Godlike. So our census dropped to thirteen ewes, and seventeen lambs (including the absent but healthy Murphy, who was settling in nicely at Sheilas place down the road). But moms and babies were beginning to nibble at the early grass; bales of hay were no longer disappearing at the winters frantic rate. Birdsong returned to the trees around the house. I allowed myself a little pride. Id had help-from Anthony, the vets, the friends advising me and cheering me on, my sister, and Paula. But true to my original covenant, Id done most of the work myself. Coping with my strange new responsibilities, Id learned what I had to learn, done what I had to do. I could hardly believe how much I suddenly knew about placentas, prolapses, milk and teats, tails and tags, and animals instinctual struggle to survive. And to help others survive. I saw some great moms when I walked through the pasture now. The donkeys, always accepting and generous, didnt seem to mind sharing their barn. No dog could have worked harder than Rose or been of greater assistance to a beleaguered human. As for my brooding Orson, as always an emotional pillar, the great instincts of his breed had risen to the occasion when the need arose. I had assembled a peaceable kingdom, and how I loved caring for it. It touched the deepest parts of me, whole and broken. If there is a link between our dogs and our humanity, there is also a link between our humanity and the care we provide to creatures that depend on us. Early on, Id planned to get rid of half my sheep after lambing season. Id keep a small flock for herding, sell the rest to local farmers. But I was having second thoughts. It would be tough for me to separate these lambs from their mothers and their birthplace. I could just hear my neighbors snort. Farm animals arent pets, theyd growl. No point in feeding one more sheep than you need. Just money down the drain. But when youve pulled a lamb out of its mother, when youve carried it into the barn, you have a different point of view. At least, I did.