Lamb triplets take over Harmony Meadow Farm
14 sets of triplets have already been born, with another thought to be on the way
It's cute overload at one Prince Edward Island farm where lambs are running the show and a number of multiple births are keeping staff hopping.
Harmony Meadow Farm in Belfast has been in operation for four years. Last year they saw 70 lambs born, but this year 102 lambs have been delivered with more still coming.
"It's a bumper crop for sure," said farm co-owner Kim Doherty-Smith.
For the farm, the stranger part is the number of multiple births.
The number of twins born this year is up and 14 sets of triplets have already been born, with another thought to be on the way. The farm usually has two or three sets of triplets each year.
Doherty-Smith said it's unusual for a farm that does everything naturally and they aren't really sure of the reason.
"We have our hay tested to make sure the nutrition is good and it just seems that the sheep before lambing were in really, really good shape," she said.
"We think that's probably what, just a matter of the kind of health that they were in before we went into the breeding season."
Harmony Meadow Farms doesn't use pesticides on its feed, they let the sheep free range as much as possible and don't use any unnatural methods for lambing.
But with all this cute comes more work and trying to find a place to put all the lambs.
"It's 30 per cent more sheep than we normally have so it is a concern," Doherty-Smith said. "And we have to figure out what we're going to do and we have more space in another barn."
Another concern is keeping tabs on feeding. With multiples, mothers sometimes can't produce enough milk for three babies, but so far only one lamb has had to be bottle fed.
The farm has also had a few sets of black triplets, which means good things for their wool business according to co-owner Steve Taran.
"The wool from there is sought after because it's not dyed it's naturally black so you make a sweater or something out of that and it's not going to fade," he said.
The farmers say the next bit of hard work is more marketing to sell the extra product.