All Soay sheep lambs, great and small

Remember two years ago when we had a teeny lamb weighing only 1 pound 15 ounces? We could not resist naming him “Saltmarsh Peanut,” and Peanut he is to this day. By way of reminder, here he is in Steve’s hands a few hours after he was born:

Peanut at about six hours

Peanut at about six hours

Although lambing has begun in earnest for 2013, we have a long way to go. But in the first week alone we had two single ewe lambs arrive who each weighed a whopping seven full pounds shortly after birth. These birth weights are the highest we have seen in our eight years of breeding British Soay sheep. Here’s one of the ewe lambs, again in Steve’s hands for visual comparison. And by the way, his hands have not shrunk since he held Peanut in 2011.

Hulking 7-pound Soay lamb

Hulking 7-pound Soay lamb

We have not had time to select this year’s county in England for naming so this “little” girl does not have her official name yet. I was thinking about naming her “Big Bertha” but then what would I name her nursery buddy, our other seven-pounder?

I realize I need to update our “how much does the average RBST Soay lamb weigh” post from 2011. I promise to do that once we finish lambing this spring. It will be interesting — for us at least — to see what impact the three additional years’ worth of lambs (the original post included data from 2006-2010 as I recall) may have on our weight data. Please stay tuned.

Meanwhile, for those of you who may have tiny Soay lambs and despair that they will ever grow up, here’s a (fuzzy, sorry) picture of Peanut taken at a few weeks shy of two years. He is ready to breed whenever we will let him!

Peanut all grown up at almost 2 years old

Peanut all grown up at almost 2 years old

For now …

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