You can watch a popular Sheffield farm's animals live from home during lockdown – and they’re adorable

But this weekend Graves Park Animal Farm will, of course, be shut to visitors to help enforce the Government’s essential social distancing measures.

However, life in the farmyard goes on. And in an effort to make sure families don't miss the usual springtime fun, staff are streaming live videos each morning at 9.30am in which viewers can watch familiar animals and meet some new arrivals.

The broadcasts can be dramatic – on April 9, farmer Jack Tankard stepped in to help deliver two lambs when a ewe’s waters broke on camera.

“We only really step in if we see something going wrong – we just like to observe, we don't really like to jump in,” says Jack, who found that the first baby’s legs were in an awkward position.

“We went in at the right time. The mum absolutely loves it and the lamb should be absolutely fine now.”

The ewe was a Texel sheep – a heavily-muscled domestic breed – that often gives birth to large single lambs, so the fact she had twins wasn’t known beforehand.

“We’re tiny, really, when it comes to lambing,” Jack explains. “If you're a big commercial farm you’d scan all your ewes.”

Mother goats make an appearance, too – in particular a trio of Boer goats called Beetroot, Broccoli and Butternut.

“Their kids are doing really well,” says Jack. “There's just Beetroot who's last to give birth. They're first-time mums and they’re doing such a good job.”

The goats, he jokes, have ‘an easy life’. “Inside their shed it’s all bedded up with fresh straw.”

Jack roams around the various pens with an iPad, asking friendly residents such as Shetland ponies Twinkle and Sprinkle, and Graves Park's red deer, to say hello.

“There aren't many places you can get up close and personal with red deer," he says.

Good weather is forecast this Easter – so good that a few showers wouldn’t go amiss, Jack thinks.

“We could do with a little bit of rain just to help with our paddocks,” he says.

See www.facebook.com/gravesparkanimalfarm/ to watch the videos.

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