Dilly-Dally

Dilly is not even a year old. She was born March 11, 2017. Most of the lambs (soon to be yearlings) won't lamb until after most of the mature ewes have lambed. But Dilly didn't waste time last October with the ram and she was the eighth ewe to lamb. I didn't have a breeding date for her and she wasn't even on my radar.                So I looked over the barn wall where I spy on the ewes and saw this. Yearlings aren't always sure about what to do with a lamb and need a little time to let their instinct kick in. It is important that a young ewe has a chance to figure out that the lamb is hers and that she really does want it. You don't want to interrupt that bonding time. However she can also be bullied or distracted by other ewes who are curious or close to lambing and will start to mother the lamb themselves.                   I walked around the gate briefly to push the other ewes away and then backed off so that Dilly would approach her lamb again.                   I gave her some time and then slowly picked up the lamb and got her to follow it into the barn.

                        This lamb was only 4.6 pounds. The other Jacob lambs are more often 7 to 8 pounds or even more.                  It was stormy and cold so I put this little lamb coat on it for the night. However the coat was too big and got wet. By morning I took it off.             Dilly's lamb at 2 days old. Farm Club members were here for part of the morning and asked me to name the lamb Dally.

Dilly-dally, from the Oxford Dictionary: Waste time through aimless wandering or indecision.

Dilly-dally, from the Urban Dictionary:  To mess around or waste time. Typically used by the very elderly.

I'll go with definition #1.That part about the very elderly bothers me.