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There Were Shepherds In The Fields
By Janet Jacobson

Luke 2:8-9. "In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them..." God chose shepherds to be the first to know about the birth of the Christ Child. According to the writer of the book of Luke, the shepherds told others who were amazed at what the shepherds with great respect and admiration. In the Old Testament, owning sheep was a sign of wealth and status. The sacrifice of a lamb was considered the perfect sacrifice as far back as Adam and Eve's son Abel. Moses kept his father in law's flock, and King David spent his youth caring for his father, Jesse's sheep. Job was blessed with 14,000 sheep along with other animals. God is frequently called a shepherd both in the Old and New Testaments. Jesus is referred to as the Lamb of God.

The importance of sheep and shepherds in Judeo-Christian history really had never occurred to me until I became a shepherd myself. In the spring of 1991 a friend gave my daughter, Anna, some bottle lambs. The first couple didn't do well and after several bouts of pneumonia, scours and bloating, they died. Finally we managed to keep two beautiful ewe lambs alive. Katie and Kelly lived with the calves for the next year. Anna and I decided we really liked sheep, but that having mothers to raise them would be a lot easier. When we had a chance to buy 20 ewes for $20.00 apiece from a shepherd going through bankruptcy, we decided to give it a try. We borrowed a ram and put up some temporary fence. None of us had any experience with sheep other than those few bottle lambs. The Carrington Research Center had a 3-day sheep school scheduled for that winter, and we decided that I should take advantage of the opportunity. Those three days have been some of the best spent time in my farming career.

Lambing that year and the next was a course in the school of experience. Some of the ewes should have been culled. I used a Hampshire ram and even though the ewes were a Columbian cross, the lambs were big headed and came in almost every birth position possible. Several ewes had vaginal and uterine prolapses. We sheared in February and the weather immediately dropped to 20 degrees below zero. The lambs came in March and the weatherman forgot it was supposed to warm up. I moved the mineral box and some of the ewes didn't find it. Lambs were born with iodine deficiencies. Some lambs developed joint ill, pneumonia and scours. We had ewes with mastitis and their lambs had to be bottle fed. I was beginning to think I had made a mistake and that one needed a degree in veterinary medicine to raise sheep. I found I could do a lot of things I wouldn't have thought possible. I could give injections, turn an unborn lamb, put a tube into a lamb's stomach and even fix a uterine prolapse in 15 minutes with the help of my partner.

Things have greatly improved since those first couple of years. I have culled the old and problem ewes. We bought some ewe lambs from a friend and have kept the biggest and best of our own. We have increased our flock from 20 to 85 ewes plus a small flock of 7 registered Shetlands. We imported 9 Franklin sheep from Robert and Celia Guilford's flock in Manitoba. Our lamb crop last year was beautiful. I only assisted a couple of ewes in lambing and didn't have a single prolapse. I treated only a couple of lambs for pneumonia and none had scours. We had two bottle lambs-I grafted one on a goat and gave the other one away. Things have gone well, but there is always more to learn.

Oh yes, Katie and Kelly are still with us. Kelly gives Anna twins every year. Katie had a severe case of mastitis and has retired to wool production and baby-sitting the feeder lambs after they're weaned. I think those two will be with us until they die of old age.

I look forward to lambing time. I love the sound of the ewes resting in the barn in the middle of the night, the soft, rhythmical grunting that almost sounds like a lullaby. Nothing is more heartwarming than the sound of a newborn lamb crying and being answered by the gentle, low murmuring of its mother. I could watch lambs for hours in their games of tag and their "popcorn dance", as my husband calls it. Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus must have been comforted by the same peaceful sounds of the animals in the stable. It was in the quiet of that stable where the shepherds found the Baby, just as the angels told them. What a great honor God granted those shepherds to be the first to know the Christ child and to share the good news of his birth!

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