Lambing

It's that time of year again.  

The time of year when one dons the traditional black and red rubber boots, loads up the wheel barrow with knapsack or whatever else one wishes to have carried 'out to the car' and proceeds to walk about a city block out to the the top of the road where the vehicle is parked for the duration of the melting and mudding process that takes place every year in our yard.  It is only with great trepidation and dire need that we will drive closer to the house until the snow, water, slush, and deep sinking mud have disappeared for fear of tearing great ruts in the lane as well as  risk having to be pulled out with a tractor.

This little night walk outside in the dark down our lane and around a corner into the persistent and ever present wind reminds me of the days when we had goats and sheep out in the barn and the trips in the spring every hour or so during lambing/kidding season.

 The air has a special quality to it late in the evening and into the early hours of dawn .  There is a  stillness and even an unexplained unique smell in the air which does not exist any other time of the day.  I would even bet that if one were to blindfold me and deny me access to what time it was in the day and walk me outside at 3:00 am I would be able to  determine within a couple of hours the time on the clock by the stillness and aura  in the air. 


I wish I could find a poem or a piece of prose that adequately describes the process that a farmer  must go through  when checking on domestic animals on the verge of giving birth in the middle of the night.

Some of the words used would be the following:

Sleeping fully clothed.
Alarm ringing.
Quietly putting on boots, coat, and hat and  opening the creaky outside door.
Cool Fresh Air awakens the senses.
Stars above and flashlight in hand.
Crunch of snow and ice underfoot.
Dog panting along side.
Startled momentary rustle as barn light is flicked on.
Smell of hay, manure, and animal scent.
Quiet gazes exchanged as scene is observed for unusual stance or isolation since the last visit. 
 Hushed accounting  and quick glance at exits to ensure all are present. 
Light flipped off...flashlight clicked on.
Quiet walk back to the darkened house.
Chilled air returns to pinch the face.
Coat, boots, flashlight deposited by door.
Soft steps back to the bed.
Alarm set for two hours hence.
Cold cheeks on soft pillow.

Country Gal

I am the product of the prairie...born and raised.

I have driven tractor, rode  on stone boats, cleaned barns with a pitch fork,  hauled grain, slopped pigs, milked goats.  I have ridden out to  muskrat traps and watched as they were skinned and hides tanned.  I have helped with the butchering of  rabbits, sheep, goats, and steers .  I have plucked  and drawn chickens and turkeys and shorn sheep. 

 I have walked barefoot across stubble fields, dirt roads, and   cow  pastures stepping in spots that were  even softer, warmer, and stickier  in consistency than any cold rain water filled mud puddle could ever be.

I have played on 'soft' ice  on the  school damn and  I have skated on a dugout until my frozen feet itched and burned bringing tears for hours afterward. 

I have ridden horses while they were outfitted with bridles, saddles, and sometimes even harnesses; and at other times just with a rope around their  neck. I have fallen off some of these same horses,  once been knocked out, and rode home again because my leg was too sore to walk that far.

I have caught grasshoppers in a Cheese Whiz jar and held them captive  in the hot sun in July.  I have chased snakes and been chased by snakes.  I have had the smell of skunk on almost every vehicle I have owned and porcupine quills on the nose of every dog befriended.

 I have  played 'chicken' with a badger while bareback on a horse.  I have carried numerous pails  of water to gopher holes after blocking the 'escape' hole with rocks; and with garden hoe in hand attempting , sometimes successfully and not without some ruthlessness, to hit the running wet rodent  until it ran no more.

At the age of eleven I fed, watered, and  bedded 48 cattle  in March for two weeks on my own while the parents were away, in Ontario ,  on business.

I have shoveled grain in a bin while the  grain was augured in  and have also shoveled grain out of the bin while the  grain  was being augured out. I have cleaned bins of old moldy grain and mouse nests with shovel and brooms.  I have driven half tons and grain trucks without gas pedals or brakes across fields and gravel roads.   I have lifted bags of fertilizer,  dragged and spread straw bales  and unrolled round feed ones.

I have hauled the backseat out of my car to transport a lambing sheep to town. I have vaccinated, docked, dehorned, and circumcised all that
demanded such procedures.


But.. I must admit that without a doubt the strangest countrygal thing that I ever ever have done was to hold onto the head (as in the part with the eyes and ears and nose) of a male goat while a veterinarian collected goat semen from another part of its body.

And that is all I am going to say about that.