The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: goosepimple on August 11, 2013, 09:15:27 pm
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See if you can throw any light on the following please:
North Ronaldsay, 2yrs old ewe, not lambed. Wormed (twice with 2 different wormers), pour on also recently fluked and multivited. Is immaciated, a thin fleece covering a skeleton. Demenour is rather surprisingly that of a happy ewe, healthy in spirit but still has a skitty bum.
Tried no feed / just grass / vegetation / just hay but all various scenarios don't change a thing. Everyone else healthy and happy, clean bums and meaty bodies. NR's have a copper intolerance but we have had this scenario before (won't go into details) and have ruled that out. She's been like this off and on for almost 2 months.
Am phoning the vet tomorrow again anyway, but just wondered if you had experience of this or if there is anything else i should do. Many thanks.
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Could it be pine? (cobalt deficiency)
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NR's are a funny bunch you have to be careful with everything. I've heard of what you say HF but don't know much about it - about to google, thanks for suggesting.
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Were the two different wormers definitely two different drug groups? Just wondering if it might be a resistance problem? The other thing that springs to mind that would cause those symptoms is Johnes' disease. Hope the vet can shed some light and your sheep is better soon.
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Also if it's fluke and she's only recently been fluked, it may take a wee while to sort her out.
:fc:
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Yes, could be fluke which might take several doses to kill off. Have you had a FEC done?
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Thank you all. She's had 2 different wormers : cydectin (strong) and panacur, hep p'd, fluked, clicked and combivited and even kaolin and morphine.
Perhaps you're right Sally, she was just fluked 7 days ago. Thanks foobar, when can I fluke her again - in a month? All the rest seem fine though, nice dry bums.
She's happy in herself and with the rest of the group, not isolating herself, yet.
I'll google your suggestions posters. Did call vet this morning who says I have done everything and there's not much else I can do. It may be a liver / copper related thing but we have been doing everything by the book totally in that respect so there's not much else we can do, time will tell.
And after spending about £300 on lab results on our last ronaldsay death on new year's day, I'm not lab resulting any more.
Maybe I should just buy myself some tasty hybrids ::) must say (and this will please you Sally), out of the 3 primitive breeds we keep, soay, ronaldsay and castlemilk moorits, the moorits are most healthy and robust beautiful sheep (well, that's cheating, they're not primitives actually, just rare breeds). Have considered just keeping a flock of them but they have lovely long legs that are so good at jumping even high dry stone dykes :D
Thanks posters, I will report back in a bit, it's always good hearing someone's learning experiences.
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which flukicide did you use? there are two main types: triclabendazole and closantel (Flukiver). The former kills younger fluke, but the latter is better for dealing with a chronic infection (I think) as it is gentler on the already sick animal. To be honest you are best to ask your vet, they can also tell you how often you need to repeat the dosing (and they should do that for free over the phone :)).
A FEC should also be cheap, either through your vet or send it away, just make sure to ask them to look for fluke.
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Occassional adult sheep can suffer from coccidiosis, although they would normally develop resistance as lambs if exposed to it, so it may be worth trying a dose of vecoxan if you can obtain a single dose to see if it works and at least eliminate that as a possibility. Our vet says to give Provita rumen stimulant for any persisting scour cases not caused by parasites.
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I would keep her for another couple of weeks with no further treatment (maybe a multivit drench without copper would help though), and see if she improves. If not (and none of your other sheep get worse) I would have to assume that she has got something else wrong with her digestive system and would think that maybe the best option is to PTS her. If your vet has said you have done all you could - then what else can you do? Especially if she is also very thin - something chronic that causes her food not to be absorbed well maybe??? (I also wasn't sure that fluke shows as diarrhoea?, I thought more like pale membranes and general non-thriftiness)
I have had the occasional sheep that "have been on the loose side" regularly and have now come to the point where any ewe that doesn't respond to the usual treatments will have to go. That is just because of the increased danger of flystrike mainly, but also every time you get the flock into a pen she will manage to smear everyone else with copious amounts of green sh*t too.... also when they have lambs - the lambs will get covered in it...
I know this is a bit of a tough stance, but I now try to minimise my workload/medical expense with my flock and not keeping animals with conditions that I cannot resolve (foot rot is another one I am still occasionally battling with) is what helps quite a bit. These ewes will never breed well...
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Thanks foobar, its triclabendazole one I gave, but will ask the vet about the other certainly if she doesn't improve.
Thanks Blacksheep, will write that one down too to discuss with vet, depends on how much all these drugs are too and getting a hold of a single dose. I have farming mums at the school who have been helpful with single doses, I always give them some money even if just a couple of pounds so they don't mind me coming back to them, so I'll have a chat to them about that.
Anke, thanks again, know what you mean about disease carrying livestock, we don't have as many as you, just 8 sheep in total, 4 of which are ronaldsays. We haven't lambed them as we wanted to see how they faired here first as they are flimsy sheep but it would probably be better to lamb them (the healthy ones) and keep the fresh lambs so we know what their background is and exactly what's gone into them. But I'm not going to rush into that, there's still a question mark over the ronaldsays here and so far they've cost us quite a bit financially... time will tell.
Thank you for your knowledgeable replies everyone.
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A lot of people, ourselves included, have felt that triclabendazole hasn't worked as well this last 12 months as previously. It may be some resistance, or it may be that the cold wet weather has changed the prevalence of the lifecycle stages at different seasons, and our time-honoured dosing regime has become outdated.
Either way, I would definitely ask the vet to recommend an alternative flukicide that you can give immediately.
The problem with FECs and fluke, is that the animal can have fluke but the flukes not be laying eggs, so then there is no sign in the faeces.
And yes, fluke is often associated with runny poo and loss of weight. By the time you see the 'bottle jaw', the condition is fairly far gone.
Cocci would show up on a FEC, wouldn't they?
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The problem with FECs and fluke, is that the animal can have fluke but the flukes not be laying eggs, so then there is no sign in the faeces. Definitely, had that here!
And yes, fluke is often associated with runny poo and loss of weight. By the time you see the 'bottle jaw', the condition is fairly far gone. I lost a lamb to suspected fluke this winter and the only hint really was her very pale membranes and she was quite thin. No runny bum at all
Cocci would show up on a FEC, wouldn't they? There are good cocci and there are bad cocci - you can have quite a high count (particularly in an adult) and it doesn't cause any problems for the animal. You would have to do quite a bit of work to distinguish between the several coccidia species, probably not worthwhile as quite expensive.
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Cocci would show up on a FEC, wouldn't they?
They bloody ought to - if they don't whoever is doing the FEC isn't doing their job.
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Cocci would show up on a FEC, wouldn't they?
They bloody ought to - if they don't whoever is doing the FEC isn't doing their job.
Yes they do show up, but a high cocci count doesn't mean anything in an adult sheep.
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And yes, fluke is often associated with runny poo and loss of weight. By the time you see the 'bottle jaw', the condition is fairly far gone.
I lost a lamb to suspected fluke this winter and the only hint really was her very pale membranes and she was quite thin. No runny bum at all
Yes, it's worth clarifying - a runny bum doesn't mean it isn't fluke. Equally, fluke does not always cause a runny bum. It does pretty much always cause loss of thrift.
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Cocci would show up on a FEC, wouldn't they?
They bloody ought to - if they don't whoever is doing the FEC isn't doing their job.
Yes they do show up, but a high cocci count doesn't mean anything in an adult sheep.
Cocci needs a different flotation solution than for a wormer fec I believe. Also there are many different species, only 2 affect sheep adversely and am not sure that you would actually get the species identified by a vets fec. Most adult sheep should be immune if they have had exposure, just occasionally an adult sheep will not have acquired immunity as a lamb and can have problems as an older sheep according to the manufacturers vet. We saw this in one ewe that had persistent scouring a few years back and she showed a rapid response to vecoxan.
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The advantage of vecoxan is its a 'cheap' treatment if your vet will dispense small amounts and it has no resistance issues like wormers.
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The advantage of vecoxan is its a 'cheap' treatment if your vet will dispense small amounts and it has no resistance issues like wormers.
But if not it's very expensive.... for acute coccidiosis in young lambs/kids etc Intradine is cheap, but needs injecting for 3 to5 days in a row. It works for me.
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For non-acute coccidiosis, then the buckets work fine. For acute coccidiosis, you might need to use vecoxan.
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Any more news on this ? I've had this happen to two Shetland hoggets a couple of years ago - tested, wormed, fluked and even after vecoxan they continued to scour. Eventually just sent them down the road.
I'd really like a solution for the future as it doesn't seem to affect a whole crop, just the odd individual.
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no sorry Calv, emailed my vet last week about vecoxan but she has been on leave, will phone this week to see what response is. The ewe in question is looking happy and oblivious otherwise I must say - keep checking the rear end but there doesn't look like fresh droppings there and she's hungry and eating / grazing so ??? she's still alive and happy and the rest have no problems... ???
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Checking her this morning before I phone the vet, she's got bottle jaw and I read from previous posts on this website that she'll be pretty far down the line for a recovery :-\ . She's been wormed twice with different wormers and fluked (few weeks back), so don't know what else to do .... any advice anyone? calling the vet anyroad.
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Repeated fluke treatments might do it, your vet should be able to advise the best course.
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She'll have had vits and mins to help her generally?
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thanks both, she's going to the vet on wednesday in a dog crate as she wants to get a look at her, yes she has combivit and I can dose her as I have the bottle (I haven't done that yet actually, will talk to vet tomorrow about that too). she's only 2yrs and a nice wee lass so would like to help her (the ewe, not the vet ::) )
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Got her to the vet today along with fresh poo sample which she tested while I was there - no worm count so its not that. Lungs were a bit noisey - she did a test (in the car park) of holding her like a
wheelbarrow ;D but no fluid coming out of the nose. Could possibly be pneumonia (spelling) but we don't know. She won't survive long when the weather gets cold, she's too skinny poor thing. Vet gave her vitamin booster and a steroid but :fc: really. She's happy for now, doesn't look in pain - I did say I would have her PTS if there was any problems or that she would be passing infection to the others but vet thinks that would have happened by now anyway ::) . So she's here for now, and that's all we can do :fc:
Thank you all.
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you know - some sheep just are skinny/framey. I have had sheep who look poor/thin and yet give me good lambs, raise them and do it again the next year.
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I know a few mums like that Steve, not me unfortunately ;)