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Edgar’s Mission Passport
Africa
Africa
Sheep
16th June 2023
Resilience
Joyful
Finding warmth
Certified true likeness
Africa’s story
Out of Africa
Updated July 3, 2023
At just three days old, the scrawny little hypothermic lamb we cradled in a heat blanket was far from out of the woods. His eyes made sleepy not through lack of it, but rather his body commencing to shut down.
Exhausted in form after having exhausted his body’s supply of adipose fat, also known as brown fat*, Africa’s condition was critical. Our thermometer’s inability to read his body temperature confirmed this.
No doubt too suffering hypoglycaemia or low blood sugar, glucose was administered to Africa’s almost lifeless form as he was gently placed into our incubator. Here it was not just its warmth keeping his body warm, but so too all of our love.
And slowly, over the ensuing hours, new life began to tingle through it.
And too ours, as the thought, “Yes. He’s going to make it,” raced through our hearts.
Every year, countless little lambs burst forth from the warm incubator that is their mother’s womb, into the frosty, in more ways than one, world
Every year, countless little lambs burst forth from the warm incubator that is their mother’s womb, into the frosty, in more ways than one, world. With a bottom line that can clearly sustain the lamb losses it does, one must ask whether, in this 21st century, this is the most humane way we should treat the other animals of this world.
From studying the bright little lamb before us today, the one we know as Africa, as he joyfully explores his new world, he encourages our kind to explore a new way of living. A far kinder one that sees compassion as our compass, not vested self-interest.
Indeed, many things come out of viewing life through Africa’s eyes, not the least that the seat of our humanity can be found in how we treat the other animals of this world.
*Adipose fat is a layer of brown fat that lambs are born with. Before their first feeding of colostrum from their mumma, it provides the energy the little ones need to regulate their body temperature. This fat is generally burned within the first five hours of life. Hence colostrum being received within this window of time is critical.
