A wee baby lamb in need
When you hear only bad things about people, this rescue is a reminder that good always outweighs the bad. For a wee lamb born into a world that rarely pauses long enough to notice her kind, the future could have been heartbreakingly short. But she found a saviour in someone well known to us—our sheep shearer Johanna who has sheared our sheep ever since our first rescue of Cedar and Douglas in 2019.
Johanna’s message to us, “I have a baby lamb ewe with bad back legs. I have a wheelchair for her and just want a place where people will put her in the chair and she has a flat surface to run on. Her mom has been feeding her but doesn’t like the wheelchair,” became a call to action.
Our new Children’s Barn seemed like the perfect spot for her—an empty stall and a wide flat hallway for wheelchair access.
It took her a couple days to settle in and feel safe. She decided she was weaned and would not take a bottle from us. Instead she is drinking milk from a bowl and is eating hay. This is the reality of farm animals—they need to grow up fast in order to have the best chance of survival. And we know that without intervention, this little disabled lamb would not have survived.
We didn’t know why her back legs weren’t working, but another one of our trusted farmers, told us therapeutic massage would be good for her and showed us how. We put the call out for any help from volunteers to help with daily massage and 16 people signed up!
She came to us on a Sunday and on Thursday she was off on a road trip to the vet.
An X-ray told the tale before she could, with a ghostly haze where healthy bone should be. Her back legs are fully functional but her rear spine is underdeveloped. She will never be able to walk, but we can 100% give her a good quality of life.
She came with a small wheelchair which she has already outgrown. We actually have three more wheelchairs in the works to give her mobility as she grows.
We named her Hazel after the tree to fit in with the rest of her sheep herd; Cedar, Douglas, Aspen and Willow. And the hazel tree has been thought to have magical and healing properties. Ancient Celts also believed it represented wisdom and poetic inspiration.
Hazel’s new story has just begun.
