A Sad Good Bye

Sometimes this whole farm thing is so hard.  Especially when you do it like this.  I know and love my animals.  My wee flock of sheep.  One day will I have so many that it won't feel like this?  I lost my dear sheepy soul sister, Draga in the morning of April 13.  Something went very, very wrong with her lambs.  We will never know exactly what because there is no way I can bring myself to do an 'autopsy' on a friend and farm companion such as she.  I suspect that either one or both of the lambs she was likely carrying died inside.  For many reasons, that I won't go into here, I suspect this is what happened.  She died in labour.

She was the most tame of all my sheep and would follow me around like a dog and come when she was called.  She was one of my first experiences with milking the first year when she gave birth to a still born ewe lamb in the middle of the night.  Was it then that we became so bonded?  I was with her through the whole ordeal.  Sweet Draga.  The next year I helped her with her twin girls - spotted like her.  She started to lick me before them.   The next year twin black boys.  And I was there with her.  She was a fierce mama and a strong headed ewe.  Once she grew up, she became Queen of the flock.

And she is gone.  Too sad for me to even write about or talk about at first.  But here it is.  It was painful for me even to walk out my door because suddenly her baa, usually the first to greet me - a low resonant baa - was missing.  In the end, I am so grateful for the 4 years she spent with me, all that she taught me and the love and affection she so freely gave me.