New lambs for Mother’s Day

Lambing News from our JMICAWE Director Cathy Dwyer

In these difficult and frightening times we wanted to share something positive and uplifting with you. In the Northern Hemisphere, this is springtime and plants and animals are bursting with new life. If you can, take a look out of the window to spot birds or trees, or sit in the garden and soak up some nature and spring life! Even as we are struggling to come to terms with the public health emergency we are all experiencing nature is getting on with the job of life, and reminding us that we are only a part of what our amazing planet can support.

In Scotland this is the time of year when many of our lambs are born. Lambing is just gearing up on our farm and, despite social distancing measures, we are enjoying seeing the new lambs being delivered and the attentive and focused maternal care they are receiving.

This lovely pair of active and vigorous lambs are only a few hours old, and already they have full bellies of colostrum and milk, and their mother is taking great care of them. How appropriate that they were born just in time for Mother’s Day! These lambs will be taking part in a behavioural study to look at the importance of maternal care in the development of young animals, and will help us to understand how we can take better care of our farmed animals.

We know that mothers feed and protect their offspring, but there is evidence that they do so much more – from providing a secure base for young animals to explore and develop confidence, shaping the stress responses and responsiveness of offspring, to their capacity to teach young animals about the world and how to behave. We will be looking at different aspects of the social, physical and mental development of lambs, and how maternal care is influencing these responses, with the help of a PhD student and two MSc students. And will be posting updates on the progress and abilities of these lambs as the study progresses!