We had two lambs die of bloat last year. Both bottle-fed, we followed the schedule of feeding on the powdered milk packaging. The intention in that schedule is to ease down from 8 feeds a day to a couple. The trouble is as you cut the number of feeds you increase the volume of milk. So we were feeding them large serves of milk (220mls), and then they were loading up on grass. They overloaded.

Bloat is a process where too much feed in the sheep's stomach ferments, and creates a foam layer that blocks air from escaping. Their stomachs expand, to the point of crushing their lungs and they suffocate.

It's very fast. Everything I read about it says how quickly it can kill an animal.

The first lamb last year caught me off-guard, and I failed to provide useful help. I found it at the bottom of a hill, where it had fallen. I carried it in, put it in a quiet spot. I went back to check it 20 minutes later, realizing too late it was going bad. I climbed into the pen, picked it up, and while I held it, it died. Very upsetting.

The second one was two days later. By then I'd done more research, and we'd discussed the feeding regime versus what farming resources were saying. After the second one died we cut back on the bottle feeds, relying on primarily self-feeding on grass. "Hungry sheep never get bloat," was the best advice I read. The remaining two bottle fed lambs, both rejected by their mothers when they collapsed in the arctic cold snap, grew up to be big fat adults.

Ringo was one of them. He's now a fat wether. He's an amiable chap, and wanders over to see what we are doing when we show up in his paddock. He often adds himself to our group when I am walking the dogs. If I don't see him, he'll stand behind me and prod me with one foot. He's happy enough to lean in and get his ears scratched. But in farming terms he's useless, and just eats.

But a year on, and again its Spring, bloat season again. A bit of rain, some warm weather, and the clover takes off. The animals gorge on the fresh new feed, and some of them go into bloat mode.

So, doing the normal after-dinner foot-patrol, I saw a sheep and her twins lolling on a hillock. Its unusual for a sheep to lie flat out. You do see it, on a warm day, when they are heavily pregnant, but not at dusk when they are on guard on behalf of their lambs, with me walking past with dogs.

I walked closer, then right up to her. Her twins ran off and stood at a distance watching. She made a feeble attempt to move, but she was exhausted….and bloating fast.

Bloat again! Using the cold calculator that farmers use, the cost of the vet would be more than the sheep was worth. But in reality that wasn't an option anyway…there wasn't any likelihood of getting a vet there in time.

I ran back to the house, and came back with a drenching gun and a solution of bicarb and water. Sometimes the bicarb neutralizes the foam layer. The other thing is to try and get some of the air out. I need to talk to someone more experienced, but what I read is that bloat in sheep is different to bloat in cows. With cows you can actually spike them, and the air pumps out of the hole. With sheep its major surgery, requiring stitches, and a vet.

So instead I wrestled with her on the ground, rolling her back and forth to burp out the gas. It produced some results- her abdomen noticeably deflated - and for a minute I thought I was getting somewhere. Then she died.

Nothing good comes from this sort of thing. The orphaned twins stood nearby, but bolted if we went towards them. In theory they are big enough to evade a fox, and they were already eating grass, so they should be ok. In theory….

It was late. It’s a fair bit of work to bury a big sheep. Depressed and defeated, I went back home. I would have to be back first thing to bury her before the warm weather got to her.

So, in the morning before breakfast I towed the corpse to suitable spot, dug out a hole and tidied up. Rigor mortis, bloat, a fox had torn out flesh….it was a depressing, grim task. It had rained, the grass was wet, the soil was heavy, wet clay. I was filthy by the time I had finished.

And her twin lambs… how did they go? I scouted around to find them, half expecting them to have disappeared without a trace.

There they were…out of the wind, sitting with Ringo, his plump torso providing cover.

That guy just earned a lifetime pension.