UNDERHILL, Vt. — Anne O’Connor found herself tallying up newborn lambs at her Vermont farm, and the count kept climbing far beyond expectations.
At Clover & Bee Farm in Underhill, Vermont, which O’Connor operates alongside her husband Gunnar, one of their ewes delivered an extraordinary litter of six healthy lambs this month. Both the mother sheep and all her offspring are thriving, making this exceptional birth even more noteworthy.
This particular ewe had previously delivered four lambs in one birth, and though veterinary examination suggested she would deliver twins this time around, O’Connor had her suspicions about a larger litter. When labor began, the lambs continued arriving one after another, she recalled.
“I was a little bit suspicious, just given how big she was and that she was going a little earlier, that she might have more than two,” she said. “Six is great, but it’s definitely — it’s plenty.”
Estimates vary widely regarding how unusual sextuplet sheep births are, with O’Connor citing odds of roughly 1 in 1,000 while certain farming websites suggest the chances could be as rare as one in a million or even rarer. O’Connor reached out to the Vermont Sheep & Goat Association regarding these births, and the organization discovered just one other local shepherd had experienced a sheep delivering this many lambs.
“They do take longer to reach full body weight, but most do just fine,” said Kristen Judkins of Gilead Fiber Farm, who owned a ewe that had sextuplets three years in a row, in an email. “You have to keep an eye on them for the first few weeks to make sure they are getting enough to eat.”
The newborn lambs, which have partial Finnsheep heritage, received Finnish names representing numbers one through six. Their mother bears the name Teemu, honoring Finnish hockey legend and Hockey Hall of Fame member Teemu Selänne. The O’Connors intend to retain the four female lambs while seeking new homes for the two males.
The operation focuses on wool production from their sheep while also cultivating herbs and berries. This marks their fifth season raising sheep on the property. Their flock continues expanding — these six newcomers, along with two other recent arrivals, have increased their total count to 21 sheep. Five additional ewes are currently expecting.
Teemu’s reproductive career likely isn’t finished. While she’ll receive some time to recover, chances are strong she’ll produce more lambs down the road, O’Connor explained.
“She’s a great mom, she’s doing awesome with this,” O’Connor said. “She’s still very much in her reproductive years, so probably a year or more and she’ll just, you know, be able to put her hooves up.”
