Nanny goat adopts and breastfeeds "disowned" lamb

Residents of Appiakwaa, a suburb of Saltpond in the Central Region have for the past three months savoured a rare spectacle of a sympathetic nanny goat that had adopted and breastfed a surviving lamb that its own mother had turned its back on.

Explaining the spectacle to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) at her residence at Saltpond, Madam Esi Banowah, owner of the animals said both the sheep and the goat by some coincidence delivered on the same day, but the sheep refused to breast-feed its two lambs. As a result one died on the third day from starvation.

Madam Banowah said when her efforts to feed the surviving lamb on tinned milk failed to work out effectively, the nanny goat regularly fed it on its breast milk alongside its own offspring out of sympathy.

Madam Banowah said the trend continued for sometime until the nanny goat had wean the lamb bringing it closer to its adopted mother as its own scared it away anytime it approached.

She said when the sheep delivered lambs for the first time, it did not allow the young ones to feed on its breast milk and both died of hunger.

She said even though the goats and the sheep were kept in one pen, the sheep always kept its offspring at bay.