A ewe has made history by giving birth to adorable quintuplets despite an ultrasound showing only four.
Staff at Hartpury University and College's Home Farm have been celebrating the 'million to one' birth after getting over the initial shock of the phenomenon.
Not only did five lambs safely arrive but they have all come out of medical checks with flying colours, GloucestershireLive reports.
Given how many of them there are, two other ewes have been drafted in as foster mums to feed a couple of the five lamps.
Even giving birth to four lambs would have been worth writing about, says farm manager Andrew Eastabrook, who has worked in agriculture for 14 years.
Andrew said: "In all my years working in agriculture, I've never come across a set of quintuplet lambs – it's a very special feat indeed.
"Apparently the chances of a ewe giving birth to quintuplets are a million to one, and it's even rarer for them to be born alive and well.
"When the mother was scanned to check she was healthy and that the pregnancy was all going well, four lambs showed up on the scan.
"That’s rare in itself because ewes tend to have only triplets at most."
The quintuplets were brought into the world at 4am on February 19.
"When the actual time to give birth came and the mother had triplets, we thought the scans must have been wrong," said Andrew.
"We moved the ewe into a separate pen to give her a rest but when we came back 35 minutes later to check on her welfare, there were another two lambs – we were literally counting sheep!
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"All five lambs weighed about 3.5kg each and I’m delighted to say that they’re all doing well, as is their mum.
"We’re keeping a close eye on them, as we do with all our animals, but they’ve settled in well and are obviously completely unaware of the excitement that their arrival has created."
Due to the unexpected number of lambs, the ewe has not got enough milk to feed all five, meaning two are with foster mothers.
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