The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: norfolk newbies on April 09, 2013, 08:42:50 am
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Hi Folks
I have a 'yo' lamb ( lincolnshire term!) who is 3 weeks old, and has been feeding off mum, who is now very listless. For the last week the lambs and ewes have been in the paddock during the day and barn at night ( coz we are soft).
She was one of twins, but her brother just stopped breathing 2 weeks ago ( he seemed fine 2 hours before and had full belly when he died, but just went completely floppy and we could not revive him, despite aga and glucose).
We have brought lil lamb inside, Mum had left her to go into field and neither mum nor lamb bleating. Lamb has some slight scouring ( which we put down to the grass/change of diet as it is not particularly rich grass at the moment), but does not appear weak/ thin. BUT she has not been bouncing around like the other lambs. She had a weepy eye a couple of days ago, but I sorted out her eyelid and it cleared up.
So she is not standing up. We have admin lucozade, but she wont take bottled milk. How to I tell if this is joint ill? ( We purple sprayed cords as soon as possible after they were born and we have a fairly low stocking density). I seem to remember another post ( which I cannot find) where a sling and multivitamins were used in a similar situation. Or do we need vet and antibiotics?
thanks all
Jo
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If its both of the twins that have had a problem I would suggest its maybe coming from the ewe. Has she plenty of milk and is she vaccinated for colostridal diseases? It would certainly be worth getting some antibiotics and if its not sucking off the bottle and cant stand I would tube it.
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It's unlikely to be joint ill at 3 weeks as that normally comes on in the first week at the latest. Coccy may be a problem or it might have worms as it's been out at pasture with ewes. Did you worm your ewes 3 weeks before lambing? or have you done any feacal egg counts recently that you can look at the results, do another one now and see if they have changed?
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Took lil lamb to vet, who is not sure, but thinks it might be joint ill. One back leg uncomfortable to manipulate. We have now dosed with Pen/Strep, and Scour halt and Ketofen. ::) . Will pen her with mum & try to see if she feeds.
In answer to earlier question, difficult to say how much milk mum has. She is one of the shyest of our ewes, and we were worried that lambs were not feeding at all in the first week, but they had full tums, so I guess she only fed when we were not around.
We have not wormed recently - usually do that as they go out, but forgot (DOH!) or done any egg counts, but will look at that. Will worm mum whilst she is in pen, see if that helps. Will worm other mums tonight as well. Thanks for the reminder!!!!
Fingers crossed that the meds work (as lil lamb is a cutie and one of the few to be 'named')
Jo
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She did not make it ( Vet said she had a slight temperature, but it now looks as though the meds did not have chance to work).
All feeling sad; I feel that there was more that we should have done, but we got the vet involved, so at least I am not beating myself up about that as well.
Thanks for the advice.
Next year we will know so much more, but so far this year has been a bit grim!
I hope others are faring better.
Jo
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We've got in a routine of doing stock tasks 24 hours before the ewes and lambs are turned out of the mothering up pens: check and trim ewe's feet, dag, worm; tail and mark lambs; mark ewes with their number and that of their lambs. No sheep goes out without this being done and we know anything marked has gone through the process so we don't have to wonder.