Agriculture
Five healthy lambs from a single ewe─── SABRINA DEAN 14:57 Fri, 24 Jul 2015
Bloemfontein - A Free State farmer was convinced he must have broken a record after one of his hand-reared sheep gave birth to five healthy lambs.
Frik Haasbroek from the farm Cypredoc between Theunissen and Welkom says he was on holiday when he got the call about the unexpected delivery. He says the ewe was one of a set of triplets, while the ram she was bred to was also a triplet.
Haasbroek says the five little lambs are all perfectly healthy and at two-weeks-old are well on their way to becoming big, beautiful sheep.
Although it is very rare to get quintuplets in sheep, with certain sources claiming it is a one-in-a-million occurrence, there are other sheep that have astounded by giving birth to eight lambs.
A report on farmandranchguide.com states that an ewe in Minnesota in the USA earlier this year gave birth to eight lambs. In England, Metro.co.uk reports that an ewe in Devon also gave birth to eight lambs but one was stillborn leaving the owners with seven healthy lambs.
Sabrina Dean/OFM News
