The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Womble on May 01, 2019, 04:23:13 pm
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Hi folks, Our last ewe lambed 36 hours ago. The lambs were really weak, so because it was late, I milked the ewe, tubed the lambs and went to bed so I didn't have to worry about them suckling.
The problem is though, that there's been no change today. They spend all their time asleep, and though they can raise their heads when woken, neither lamb is making any attempt to stand. Also, if I try to make them stand, they just fall over again, without trying at all.
It might be worth mentioning that whilst labour was not particularly long, I did assist with both births - the first lamb had a leg back, and the second both legs back. Could this be because they weren't vigorous enough to wriggle themselves into the correct position on their own? From raddle records, I think they were born about three days early.
Anyway, they've had kickstart and are getting Mum's colostrum tubed every few hours. However, does anybody know what might be going on, and what we should do about it?
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Could just be they need a bit of time to get going. Have you got them under a heat lamp? In my experience heat will do wonders for weaker lambs. Any of ours that are slow to get going go under one. I've got a calf under a lamp today :raining: I would just keep persevering with tubing and keeping them warm.
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Yes, good point. They are in a dry barn with plenty of bedding and a heat lamp.
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Oh, another question - how much and how often would you tube them? They don't have fuel gauges :-(
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Vet always told us little and often. I don't like tubing so have used a small syringe to try and encourage the sucking reflex. Raddle marks? Ha! I start watching from 140 days due to the fact that mine drop early and don't talk!!
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Every 4 hours, 150-200ml a time (that’s for a commercial size lamb) is what I would do. 3 days early wouldn’t worry me, anything more than a week early is dicey ground but 3 days should be fine. Did the ewe get fed enough in the last 6 weeks of pregnancy- what condition is she in?
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Hi Twizzel, that's what I've been doing. I'm just used to lambs up and sucking within half an hour, so this one is new to me.
The ewe was fed the same as all the rest and is CS2, so a little thinner than I'd like. However, she wants the lambs, and has milk.
PipKelpy - fair enough! We find ours usually give birth at 143 to 146 days, which I believe is a bit less than other breeds anyway? This one was at 140 we think, so not too much of an outlier, but I thought perhaps worth mentioning. If they gain some strength, I'll hold them on the ewe to suck. However, at least this way they're not getting used to the bottle (and excluding teats later), and I know how much they've had!
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I would put under a heat lamp too, if you've tubed them I'd leave it at least 4hrs or so under the lamp before offering a bottle, sometimes they come around quickly and will suck, sometimes it takes a bit longer.
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Not good that they still cannot stand at this stage, you can only keep going and hope, they should get stronger given time . Warmth and 50ml per kg with 200ml per kg in 24hrs :fc:
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Just a thought... If they are red and warm with no need to go looking for food do they have any incentive to get up?
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Perhaps not, but I can pick up any other sleeping lamb I fancy and stand it up without it immediately flopping over again.
I've got videos, but don't know how I would post them here?
An experienced farmer friend said possible vitamin E deficiency, and recommended I give them vitesel (vitamin E plus selenium). Watch this space!
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It might be worth getting the vet to look before the weekend; they will give a realistic view on whether it’s worth persevering or whether to call it a day ???
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It's early days yet. I'll keep you all posted.
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Have you thought that they may have swayback?
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An injection of vit E might help and won' hurt that and iodine can certainly cause dopey calves . Normally swayback and white muscle are progressive as the lamb gets older
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OK, so I spoke to the vet. He recommended an injection of vitamin E plus celinedion. Apparently that should help their hearts to go on :coat: .
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Are you sure he didn't say selenium ,google keeps telling me celinedion is a Canadian singer :innocent:
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How are they today Womble?
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Are you sure he didn't say selenium ,google keeps telling me celinedion is a Canadian singer :innocent:
OK, I surrender! The phonecall was quite faint and I was all by myself. However, that's the way it is. Now a new day has come, the power of love has made me think twice; perhaps he did say selenium after all.
So, snapping back into serious mode for a second, they had the injection yesterday afternoon and now seem to be slowly making progress (thanks for asking, Penninehillbilly!). They can now stand unaided, but still need help to suckle. Luckily Mum is the patient sort, so hopefully we'll get there. Watch this space!
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Hi Womble, I read somewhere that lambs that have been oxygen deprived at birth might take a while to stand. If you helped them both then I guess labour was prolonged (or else why intervene?) and if prolonged then O2 supply to the placenta and therefore to the lambs might have been low for some time. Frightening words like hypoxic brain injury come to mind.
How are they now?
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Hi Liz, Actually labour wasn't all that prolonged - I just happened to spot things weren't quite right, so intervened quickly rather than wait for things to get worse!
The good news is that both lambs are now up and sucking on their own, so I'm hopeful they'll now make a full recovery. Was it the vitamin E? we'll probably never know. But I think all's well that ends well :thumbsup: and we'll take what steps we can to prevent it from happening again.
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That's great news... :D
When going the extra mile pays of its good to hear.
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Hi folks, I think this thread is worth an update, two years on. TLDR: I believe it was a selenium deficiency in the ewe.
One of the lambs described above went on to do reasonably well. She was a little bit smaller than her friends, but not by much.
The other lamb never made it anywhere near slaughter weight by winter, and actually we had it PTS, rather than have it suffer on through the winter. An informal PM showed it had very little muscle, and that the muscles were quite pale in comparison to usual.
Fast forward:
She was empty last year and we earmarked her for mutton. However, that never happened, due to Covid. So, this year, we gave her an injection of vitamin E and Selenium four weeks before her due date. We then repeated that two days before she lambed, and she went on to give birth to three perfectly normal, healthy lambs.
Each of these lambs was given a further injection at birth, and are now doing well. I'll take the vet's advice as to whether more is needed or not.
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'White muscle disease' - selenium deficiency, but you got there on your own :thumbsup:
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Yes indeed, Fleecewife. The thing I hadn't made the connection with before was that the root cause was some problem with the ewe's own pathways(?) for using selenium. I suspect that the lamb which did ok had not inherited this, whilst the lamb which did poorly had the same issue.
It'll be interesting to see how this year's lambs turn out. At least we know what to do if they're not keeping up though.
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I think the same thing may have been the cause of a Heb we had which failed to thrive about 15 years ago. We had him pts eventually but I didn't know about white muscle disease and selenium deficiency at the time. So a rethink before we lamb next year, just to be safe. We're not lambing this year.
Thanks for posting your update on the original lambs and on what happened to the same ewe this year.
Thus we learn ;D :thumbsup: