Lamb Weaning Himself Early?
Hi, all! New to Reddit and relatively new to sheep. Y'all have been invaluable after one of the two "never seen a ram" ewe lambs I got a couple months ago gave us a surprise lamb.
The lamb, Scaramouche, was born 04/24. He's healthy, nurses well, has access to his mother who seems to be producing a good supply of milk, and gets supplemental bottles in the morning and night because he's gigantic compared to his mother. See first photo, which is when he was only a couple days old. At two weeks old, he can now use his mother as a headrest while standing.
He is also really, really dedicated to eating grass and other foliage, and has been since he got teeth. Today while I was doing chores around the pasture, he ate a decent number of vine maple leaves that his mother and aunt were also munching on. He'll eat new blackberry leaves, some tender grasses, and just about anything soft enough. Creep feed and alfalfa hay don't seem to interest him, although he has access to both.
We've given him a couple of doses of First Arrival rumen probiotics, and his gut seems to be working just fine. For the past week he's focused more and more on plants and less on milk. Sometimes he'll only drink an ounce or two of his bottle, but his stomach is full and he's bright and lively. I'm just scratching my head because everything I read suggests he is really young to start weaning. Any experiences with this? Thanks!