The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: tommytink on March 02, 2020, 07:22:46 am
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Got sheep back to lambing shed on Saturday. Went down this morning and we have a dead lamb. First one and it’s dead. Aside from feeling responsible, what should we do for the ewe now? She’s calling for it but has eaten some cake. I know courses advised milking her colostrum off but she seems pretty distressed I’m more worried about that. She also has a long string hanging, presumably this is the afterbirth. Is this okay to be dragging the floor? I think I should let it come out naturally, vet on course said it could take a couple of days in some cases. Any advice appreciated as always.
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You could foster a lamb onto her but to be honest you’ve probably missed the boat on that one. So I would cut her feed down, give her only straw and a bit of hay to eat, and let her milk dry up. The stringy bit will be afterbirth- it should come away this morning but if it doesn’t give the vet a ring. Don’t pull it yourself. Sadly lambing is not always cute lambs there are a lot that don’t make it. I am nearly finished my sheep, I too had a set of small dead triplets and sadly lost a ewe too. But you need to not linger on this one and focus on the ewes next to deliver. Good luck :thumbsup:
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Thanks Twizzel. I appreciate not everything will survive but because this was the first one it’s pretty depressing. It’s been the toughest time of our lives starting afresh and it sometimes feels like if it can go wrong it will, no matter how many times I tell myself to keep on going!
My OH said lamb was on the floor in the birthing mess and didn’t look like it had moved at all, so he thinks it was maybe born dead. She had cleaned it off. So sad for her. The afterbirth has come out now. Should we try and clean her up a bit?
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If you want to but I wouldn’t worry to be honest. The lamb could have been presented wrong and died during the lambing process :gloomy: now you’ve had the first lamb I would increase your checks on the sheep, only last night I had a ewe start lambing at 11pm, by 1am she had lambed the first which was up and sucking but the second was coming back wards, if I hadn’t found her then the lamb most probably would have died :-(
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She was due tomorrow. The next one was due Thurs but we now think she isn’t pregnant. So the next one isn’t till Sun. I wake in the night all the time anyway and am kicking myself for not checking on them earlier.
I’ve looked on other posts as well and like you say it says don’t let her have good grazing. We have a field we were saving to turn them out onto. We were going to let them in there now during the days and gather them in for the nights as they only have access to hay and their ration of cake. We thought it’d help keep the indoor area a bit cleaner as well. Not sure if that’s best or not, but with the gap we have it’s a long time for them to be stuck on the yard. Either way I guess we shouldn’t put her on the green grass now but on poorer grazing? We have plenty of that thanks to the weather. Was thinking about putting her and our two presumed-empties in with the Badgers maybe, and split the ram off (he’d be in an adjacent field so not without contact with other sheep). Just trying to do what’s best all the time.
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I wouldn't take the 'due dates' so literally, they can go a week either side.
Sorry to hear your bad news. Its never easy and particularly hard when you have a perfectly healthy lamb that is dead for no apparent reason. I've had two this year. The first was a young ewe and she'd cleaned it up but it was dead. The second was another young ewe that was taking ages to lamb so I assisted, lamb came out fine and was alive but I couldn't get him to take a breath of air (even tried mouth to mouth - which was pretty gross). Its the first I've ever had like that. Luckily for the ewe she had a second healthy lamb.
I would keep your ewe in with the others so you can keep an eye on her. Don't milk her at all, if you do it will encourage her to produce more milk. Check her bag daily for any hardness (mastitus). Feed her hay and water, no nuts.
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Just checked her over. Her bag wasn’t hot or hard. I have milked off that colostrum (not purposefully ignoring your advice bj, only just seen your post) because a) it will be useful to have it if needed and b) I didn’t want her to feel swollen or uncomfortable. I didn’t empty her out, and I won’t do it again, but I will check on her daily.
If I let the remaining pregnant sheep graze the “good” field during the day, and bring them in at night, I can’t let her go with them as it’ll be too good a diet and encourage the milk. Right? And I can’t leave her in the yard by herself. I could put her with the other two presumed-empties who we were going to stick in with the Badgers (although this could be a problem when we feed the Badgers the cake). Their field is poor but we have nowhere else they can go (saving them a field to lamb in) so are feeding hay and cake and they have a mineral bucket. This year has just been a nightmare :(
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I have successfully adopted lambs onto bereaved ewes after a week, so you have definitely not missed the boat on that. Giving her a lamb is the best thing for her, emotionally and physiologically.
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:hug: It is often the case that whatever problems one is going to have come at the start of lambing, so don't get despondent, it will pick up :hug:
I see she's cleansed now :thumbsup:. My experience is that if they don't cleanse within 12 hours they benefit from antibiotics. I am someone who shouts out about not using antibiotics willy-nilly, but a ewe that doesn't cleanse promptly is a case where it's better safe than sorry. And especially when there's a dead lamb; we don't know why it didn't live, but it could be that whatever that was has also laid the ewe low.
As you don't know why it didn't live, I would be scrupulous about cleaning up and make sure no other sheep come into contact with any foetal material or straw that was soiled, etc. Get all the clothes you were wearing in the wash too, and scrub down the pen and hurdles etc.
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Why do you think that two of your ewes are empty? Were they scanned? We don't scan and sometimes we have ewes who don't look in lamb at all, then one day out pops a lamb! What I'm saying is that if you're not positive they are not in lamb, don't cut their feed to a bare field. We tend to just wait and if by a few days after the last possible date of lambing (counting from when the tups came out) there's no lamb, then we judge her empty. In 24 years we have only had a couple of genuinely empty ewes, and they have lambed in subsequent years. If your ewes are empty and have been eating with the in-lamb ewes then they may be a bit tubby by the end but there's plenty of time for them to get back to normal before tupping time.
If your ewe with the dead lamb was still retaining her placenta after 2 days, then we would give an antibiotic - not a general one that you might keep in stock, but a specific one prescribed by the vet. This would cover her until she does cleanse. I see that she has cleansed now, so info for next time.
Cheer up, losing your first lamb is so sad, and you feel for the ewe, but she will stop grieving, usually a couple of days after birthing. Once you have live lambs bouncing around, that little dead lamb will just be a small black spot in your memory :hug:
Cross posted with Sally, slightly different times suggested for giving antiBs, just go by what your vet suggests.
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Her bag won’t be full immediately after lambing, but it will become firmer in the next few days- and it’s this fullness that tells her to stop producing milk. I had a ewe abort her triplets last Wednesday night, I stripped about a litre from her when she lambed as I had a set of quads that needed a bit more colostrum, but since then I haven’t touched her udder. It is hard and full but doesn’t have mastitis, she is in a pen with hay/straw to eat- isolated from the rest until we take bloods to find out why she aborted.
As said due dates can vary- be ready for lambs from about 142 days. This year the earliest I had lambs was a set of quads at 142 days and a set of twins at 149 days.
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I got about 200ml out of her. Not done it before but watched a good YouTube video and worked it out from there.
She just keeps calling for it. Feel so bad for her and guilty myself. Just have it in my head if I’d been there it wouldn’t have turned out that way. Doesn’t help when someone (not on here) says she may have needed help ::)
I’ve cleaned out all the dirty straw, limed the affected area of the floor, and put fresh straw down. It was a communal area, we have pens for mothering up but obvs didn’t get that far.
We don’t think the other two are in lamb as the ram returned to them both. We’ve had to keep him in as we had no company for him and didn’t feel it right to keep him by himself. He went back to one a month later. Fair enough, but then he went back to her on Saturday as well. The other one he went back to in January. So something else that didn’t work out very well to add to our long list!! Also when I look at their vulvas they aren’t at all baggy-looking or swollen, they’re a lot more tucked up. So this is why I think they’re not. We didn’t get them scanned as we were going to take them to a neighbouring farm to get them done but it ended up they didn’t confirm to us a date/time and didn’t answer their phone when we tried to call to see if it was going ahead. In other words another screw up. This year we’ll be sorting our own scanning out!
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Have you tried to get her a lamb? Local lamb bank, local farmers?
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You could always try a foster lamb but be prepared to bottle feed it if she rejects it. I skinned one of my triplets and tried to foster another lamb on wearing the skin but my ewe rejected it- and kept calling for her own lamb. Last year I succeeded with another ewe... it’s a bit pot luck.
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My experience differs. In general I have found that a bereaved ewe will take a foster without too much trouble. Setting a second lamb onto a ewe which has lost one of a pair, now that is a different kettle of fish altogether and I no longer attempt that; even when you get it to work, you too often find the fostered lamb doesn't do as well because she always favours her natural child, and you often find that in fact the fostered child is pinching from other ewes, which is not in anybody's interests.
With a bereaved ewe, it certainly helps to rub the foster into the birth fluids and the dead lamb (make sure you get the smell onto the top of its head, and under and over the top of its tail), and having the dead lamb's skin as a jacket can help too. (Leave the anus and tail on the skin if you can bear too - it does help.) But even when you don't have all those things, you can usually get her to take a foster with a little patience. Support feeds - hold the ewe steady, gently but firmly, while the lamb gets a bellyful - until one day you find the lamb isn't hungry :hugsheep:
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No I’ve not tried to get her a lamb. To be honest I don’t want the biosecurity risk as the way our luck has gone I’ll be asking for it. The lambing loss course I went to (how ironic!) said bringing in orphan lambs can be a large factor in the transmission of enzootic abortion due to not knowing history etc. and as we don’t have any symptoms of that (touch wood) I don’t want to jinx it. Plus the chance she wouldn’t take to it either, I don’t want any pet lambs if it can be helped.
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Enzootic abortion is spread by contact with foetal material, birth fluids and the placenta from an aborting ewe. A live healthy orphan lamb is not a vector for this disease.
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My experience differs. In general I have found that a bereaved ewe will take a foster without too much trouble. Setting a second lamb onto a ewe which has lost one of a pair, now that is a different kettle of fish altogether and I no longer attempt that; even when you get it to work, you too often find the fostered lamb doesn't do as well because she always favours her natural child, and you often find that in fact the fostered child is pinching from other ewes, which is not in anybody's interests.
With a bereaved ewe, it certainly helps to rub the foster into the birth fluids and the dead lamb (make sure you get the smell onto the top of its head, and under and over the top of its tail), and having the dead lamb's skin as a jacket can help too. (Leave the anus and tail on the skin if you can bear too - it does help.) But even when you don't have all those things, you can usually get her to take a foster with a little patience. Support feeds - hold the ewe steady, gently but firmly, while the lamb gets a bellyful - until one day you find the lamb isn't hungry :hugsheep:
Funny how sheep differ- i fostered a lamb onto a ewe at the weekend that had a dead lamb and live twin- nabbed the live lamb before she licked it too much, wet the fostered lamb, mixed the 2 together in a bucket, gave the ewe the fostered lamb which she started licking, then gave her her own lamb. She took both, and is totally 100% happy with the fostered one. Last year she also fostered a lamb using the skin method after both her lambs were born dead.
Yet my ewe with her dead lambs did not want to know the fostered lamb wearing the skin (and I left the tail on too). And in fact rejected her own lamb 2 years ago even after spending a decent spell in an adopter. So after blood testing to find out why she aborted, she will go for cull :rant:
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I don't know how easy it is to get your sheep to and from the field but if it is likely to cause stress don't do it.
I assume you have mothering pens set up in your shed. I would have put the sheep and her dead lamb in a pen until either I had a foster lamb or until she stopped shouting for it.
I find disinfectant powder really useful in the lamb shed.
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Here’s the link that’s actually relevant to the courses I attended. Says enzo can be passed from infected ewe to ewe lamb.
https://businesswales.gov.wales/farmingconnect/news-and-events/news/vets-advise-sheep-farmers-preventing-abortion-and-barren-ewes
Ram lambs could bring it in but unlikely unless as you say contaminated from foetal matter.
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Here’s the link that’s actually relevant to the courses I attended. Says enzo can be passed from infected ewe to ewe lamb.
https://businesswales.gov.wales/farmingconnect/news-and-events/news/vets-advise-sheep-farmers-preventing-abortion-and-barren-ewes (https://businesswales.gov.wales/farmingconnect/news-and-events/news/vets-advise-sheep-farmers-preventing-abortion-and-barren-ewes)
Ram lambs could bring it in but unlikely unless as you say contaminated from foetal matter.
It is always a risk bringing new stock on. It is the same at tupping time if you don't have a closed flock.
The point you make about ewes passing enzo to ewe lambs means you shouldn't keep those ewe lambs for breeding.
You don't know why you lost your lamb. Only a PM would have given you the answer. It could be that bringing them in at the weekend caused her stress and it was not infection. Hopefully, you have just had a bad start and things will get better.
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Personally I blame myself. I think she may have needed help a bit of help and we hadn’t checked in time. The OH seems to think it may already have been dead, but this kind of matches what I think. I will always be the person that feels responsible and that I should’ve/could’ve done more.
She didn’t seem stressed at all when she came in. They are easy to move, they just follow you, so no herding or pressure applied to them.
We made the decision to move her out of the lambing area and into a field with the other two non-pregnant ewes. Thought it best to get her out of that area where there must still be smells, and she remembers the lamb being there. She seems better for it in that she’s no longer constantly calling, so hopefully she’ll continue to settle.
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Personally I blame myself. I think she may have needed help a bit of help and we hadn’t checked in time.
I think that is quite a natural thing to do, but in reality you can't be there every moment of the day. Some ewes are very obvious when lambing and some don't show at all. Even the most experienced people get cought out, so try not to feel too down.
I have CCTV in the shed this year and its made a massive difference. Last night I watched my partner go and check the ewes, I could see one was in the early stages but she looked totally normal when being visually checked. On CCTV I could keep an eye on her without her realising she was being watched. You can also view on your phone, so you can check them in the night without even getting out of bed!
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I would love cctv and did look into it at the weekend but trouble is our WiFi signal won’t reach that far. We’d have to hardwire it which is a project for another time. That’s if we keep going!!
Am checking every two hours now but it’s hard to do without disturbing them. It’s only a small lambing shed, so if we go in they’re right there and sometimes they get up, but if we look through the slats from the outside it’s difficult to see if anything’s happening. They’re all usually laid down, not moving about. I guess we’ll be able to tell when something is happening. If something is happening do you stay in the shed to make sure things go ok, or leave them be and check every ten mins or so?
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A ewe looking to lamb will take herself off from the main flock so that is usually your first indication. I know they don't read the book but you might find it helpful to write down the process and possible timings in a bullet point list. If I had a ewe that had gone off to a quiet corner I'd check in half an hour. If you feel unsure what to do put the kettle on and think through what you think is happening and if you need to do anything, if you think you need to do something ask yourself why. And don't forget to drink your tea. :sheep: :sheep:
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If you walk into their space, that will disturb them a little, even once they're used to you.
Is there room in the shed to make a wee hurdle or pellet pen around the door? If you can get them used to you coming in to that, but not into their area, then you should be able to check on them without disturbing them, or at least not more than having them look up at you.
If you can put a chair in that little observation pen, and take a cuppa down with you, and sit and drink your cuppa while keeping an eye on them, you will probably not miss signs that someone is thinking about lambing. If you just look for 30 seconds, they will mask any changes because of the "sheep prey, human predator" thing ;)
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The sure fire way to tell if she is close (less than 12 hours) to lambing is when her flanks hollow just in front of the hips- the lambs have then moved into the birth canal. With a bit of practise you’ll be able to tell who is close to lambing and who isn’t.
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The sure fire way to tell if she is close (less than 12 hours) to lambing is when her flanks hollow just in front of the hips- the lambs have then moved into the birth canal. With a bit of practise you’ll be able to tell who is close to lambing and who isn’t.
Once you've developed your 'eye' for it, it's a great indicator for an imminent lambing, I agree. Dangerous to assume the other way around, that she won't lamb overnight if she doesn't have the hollow!
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Yep - did the bullet point list! Thought it’d help as you say to have it down simple.
The shed isn’t massive. We have a couple of pens set up to one side of the door and they have free access to the yard area in the day. So I haven’t room to make around the door but this has given me an idea of how to check them with hopefully less disturbance. I won’t bore you with the details but thank you for the idea Sally!
I did calmly sit in with them this morning. One was laid down and I’m sure her tummy was moving! I’ll an eye for the hollow flanks.
So just to confirm, if they are up to something they will prob stop if we’re just having a look, and we should actually wait a few minutes for them to relax again to be able to tell?
I take a torch down and point this to the ceiling so it lights it up without blinding anyone. We did buy some nightlights but as it’s not an enclosed room it didn’t really work!
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I don't agree with the statement about the lamb being born within 15 minutes of it first appearing at the vulva. It is that quick in some breeds (eg Shetlands with Shetland lambs) but can take considerably longer in more meaty animals.
My rule of thumb is that I want to see progress every 10-15 minutes, so once the toes have appeared I would want to check if there isn't more to see each time I look, or if she seems to have stopped trying for a continuous period of 15-20 minutes.
And you need to check that it's toes you can see, that they seem to be front legs (soles down), and that the nose appears shortly after the toes appear. If there are no hooves, or if it's just one foot, or it's soles uppermost, or no nose appears following the toes, then you need to check her.
If it's back legs (soles uppermost), get on and deliver immediately in case the lamb takes its first breath inside the birth canal.
If there is no nose following the toes, then the head may be bent back and not in the birth canal, so get lubed up, find the head and bring the nose down on top of the legs.
No hooves usually means either full breech - tail first, all legs pointing back into mum - which also needs urgent intervention as she cannot get the lamb out unassisted with this presentation, or it could be nose coming, legs back, and you need to get in and push the head back in and bring the legs forward quickly, before the head swells and it all gets much more difficult to do.
It is also fine if the sac doesn't rupture until the lamb is born, as long as the ewe (or you if she doesn't do it) breaks it as soon as the lamb hits the ground. They don't need to breathe until the cord breaks, and the cord usually doesn't break until the ewe stands up / turns around. When I assist a lambing, I don't pull the lamb away from her back end until I've cleared its nostrils, and if it's been a hard lambing I give the lamb and the ewe a moment to rest before pulling it to her nose (which usually breaks the cord.) If she's a first-timer, I rub birth fluids over her nose so she has to lick her nose to clear them, and that usually triggers the instinct to lick the lamb clean. While she is doing that, I check that both teats are working.
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I would love cctv and did look into it at the weekend but trouble is our WiFi signal won’t reach that far. We’d have to hardwire it which is a project for another time. That’s if we keep going!!
You can get camera that transmit IP-over-wire, so it comes through your electricity cable, that is if you have lights etc in your shed and the cable comes to/ from your house, you can use that with some kind of gizmo to get the signal through. I use my camera that way in my goatshed.
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Just to reiterate how easily things can go wrong... just had a ewe lamb- the first lamb was coming head first, no legs... got that out all ok after finding the legs. The second was backwards :rant: had she been left i probably would have had 2 dead lambs. So don’t beat yourself up as things can go pear shaped very easily.
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You can get CCTV cameras that don't need any wires or WiFi. There's one called ARLO GO. It has a rechargeable battery and works with a SIM card from Vodafone which costs £4.00 a month. The cameras aren't cheap but do the job if you've no internet connection. They are infra red at night. Hope this helps.
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I would love cctv and did look into it at the weekend but trouble is our WiFi signal won’t reach that far. We’d have to hardwire it which is a project for another time. That’s if we keep going!!
You can get camera that transmit IP-over-wire, so it comes through your electricity cable, that is if you have lights etc in your shed and the cable comes to/ from your house, you can use that with some kind of gizmo to get the signal through. I use my camera that way in my goatshed.
Thanks for mentioning this. I had a thing like this at one of my old houses to get WiFi from downstairs to upstairs and totally forgot about it. Now I’ve just got to find it after two house moves :-\
I don’t get mobile signal there either so don’t think the Arlo camera would work. The joys of living in a valley!!
Thanks for the tips Sally. I had typed up another sheet with info on how to deal with different presentations so good to see it matches what you’ve said. I’ll try and remember to check teats are working too.
A happier day today anyway with our first new additions, twin ewe lambs!
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You can get camera that transmit IP-over-wire, so it comes through your electricity cable, that is if you have lights etc in your shed and the cable comes to/ from your house, you can use that with some kind of gizmo to get the signal through. I use my camera that way in my goatshed.
Thanks for mentioning this. I had a thing like this at one of my old houses to get WiFi from downstairs to upstairs and totally forgot about it. Now I’ve just got to find it after two house moves :-\
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It has to be on the same circuit or something - our stable is on a different one to the rest of the house, so we couldn't use it. If you have one it's no harm done trying, I guess. What I did was just run a really long outdoor internet cable up to the stables.
CCTV definitely helps with the nights.
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A happier day today anyway with our first new additions, twin ewe lambs!
Hurrah! :excited: :love: :sheep: :hugsheep:
Pictures are obligatory :eyelashes: :innocent:
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I tried but it said it was too big! Even though I’ve attached before? I’ll try again...
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Awww :love: they look fab :)
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Can’t believe they’re here! Keep checking them. Get worried if they’re just laid down but guess lambs need sleep too!
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fantastic to see your new additions - and ewe lambs too! I allow myself to become attached to those, every ewe lamb I have I think 'oh she's very nice, I'll keep her for back breeding' :)
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Well done! Your first home grown lambs! :sheep: :hugsheep: You must be so proud.
Did they come out quite easily or did you have to intervene?
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She was showing signs for about an hour- pawing, pulling her lips back. I had a guy we know come over and he caught hold of her to check and said she was ready but it was a pretty tight exit, for the first one at least. Then he just pulled the second one as well, which came a lot easier.
Yesterday we had another set of twins which we dealt with ourselves. The amniotic sac was out but wasn’t breaking. Eventually it did and she was straining for about 20 minutes but didn’t seem to be getting anywhere so I helped with that one. She wasn’t as tight as the first ewe to lamb. We let her clean it off and the other one started coming out but she was being so attentive to the first one she wasn’t pushing or anything. We left again about 20 minutes and then just helped her with that one too. We wanted her to do it herself, and I remember what everyone says about giving time, but I think I was anxious as we had the dead lamb and then the other ewe being quite tight. She seemed to be putting a lot of effort in to pushing, which I guess is the norm, but I didn’t know if she was struggling more. In retrospect I should maybe have left her? I obvs don’t want to be involved with every lambing!
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I guess with experience you just know when to intervene. If I’ve pulled the first lamb I’ll generally pull the others providing they are up and I can feel feet (not low down in the tummy). Some people leave the ewe to have the second or third herself, some will pull the rest of the lambs.
I will add that most of my ewes have needed help- mainly due to mispresented lambs, not sure why :thinking: great example was found a triplet last week with 2 good sized lambs- if she wasn’t scanned you would think she had just had twins. Put my hand in and all I could feel was a tail :tired: :yuck:
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Experience will help in deciding when to intervene and when to leave alone.
One rule is if there's been one that took some time / needed a lot of help, you don't want any that are behind to be kept waiting much longer, especially if you know / suspect there are three.
I find that most of the problems with mothering (including lambs which don't thrive later on, which is a more subtle one to spot and harder to be sure of the reasons) arise from too much intervention. So unless I think a lamb or ewe is struggling, if I have any concerns then I will just check that the presentation is good and then let the ewe try a while longer.
And assistance with one that's just taking time / the ewe is a bit tight, I will try first to help by applying supporting (pulling but not excessively) pressure when the ewe is straining, and then just holding the legs steady until she strains again. Only if after maybe three or five good contractions no progress is occurring will I pull any harder. If it's the vulva that's tight (usually only with a first-timer), I gently work on stretching the vulva around the head with a very well-lubed hand. My experience is that the more the ewe was made to deliver faster than she wanted, the more likely are mothering problems.
If it's the shoulders which are sticking, then often pulling one front leg fully forward will lengthen the shoulder joint sufficiently to allow the shoulders to come.
If it's hips/rump which are sticking, you will need to help, but take care that you don't bruise the ewe. So again, pulling as she strains, then just stopping the lamb from going back in and letting the ewe rest before the next contraction.
Make good notes about who had what problems and what you did. Then after they've all lambed and all the families are out and happy at grass, review your notes and look for clusters. Then think about why those clusters had those problems, and think of some changes you can make next year to reduce them.
For instance, we had one tup whose lambs on one batch of ewes were all too large. On all the other ewes, no problem. So we didn't pair him with that batch of ewes again.
If all the lambs are overlarge and you fed cake before lambing, feed less next time. If all the lambs are overlarge and you didn't feed cake, and the ewes weren't on overlush grass, don't use that tup on those ewes again. And so on.
If all the ewes are lacking enough milk, give them better grass next time if you can, otherwise some cake. (But calibrate for conditions - it's been stupid wet this year, so the grass won't have been as nutritious as it would be in a drier year, etc.)
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I will add that most of my ewes have needed help- mainly due to mispresented lambs, not sure why :thinking: great example was found a triplet last week with 2 good sized lambs- if she wasn’t scanned you would think she had just had twins. Put my hand in and all I could feel was a tail :tired: :yuck:
Dystocia can be a factor of the tup and / or a lack of minerals. If that tup hasn't given problems before, it's likely minerals. It's been a very wet winter; wet grass isn't as nutritious, licks get washed away, etc.
Keep himalayan rock salt always available if you don't already, and / or a pre-lambing lick, and maybe consider a mineral drench - a good chelated one like Ovithrive - at around 2 months before lambing next time.
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Another one this morning!
When I went to shed to check she was already pushing. Left her and she delivered it herself which was great. A single ram lamb. It was hard leaving them be. I am definitely over-anxious but keep telling myself what someone said here - stop and think why I’m going to do something. So I also stayed out the way and watched him find the teat. It’s been drilled into me how important colostrum is!
If the others lambs are the same I hope it means we got our feeding right - single lamb wasn’t massive and twins weren’t tiny.
I’ve been looking at ear-tagging and registration- it says they need to be tagged before nine months of age. So until they’re tagged I don’t register them in any way?
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I will add that most of my ewes have needed help- mainly due to mispresented lambs, not sure why :thinking: great example was found a triplet last week with 2 good sized lambs- if she wasn’t scanned you would think she had just had twins. Put my hand in and all I could feel was a tail :tired: :yuck:
What sheep have you got Twizzel?
I thought yesterday I should’ve checked my twin lamber didn’t have another, but she did pass two afterbirths. The first one the guy said feel in there and see so I could see what it felt like when there aren’t any more.
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Lleyns... normally easy lambing :roflanim: but they are prolific. I don’t think it’s just the lleyn ram that is influencing the malpresented lambs but will be interesting to see what happens when he goes in the summer and we start lambing his replacement’s lambs next year.
R.e tagging it can be done up to 9 mths but best either done now at birth or in the autumn after flies have gone. In which case tag slaughter lambs before you load onto trailer. Registration all depends on the breed society. You’ll need to note births in your flock/movement book though, and castrate any ram lambs before 1 week of age, same with ringing tails.
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So if I tag before turning them out that’ll be okay. Then I can record their numbers in the book. I was thinking I had to notify somewhere like you do the movements.
Will do the castration. No docking of tails for these guys though. I have joined the flock society but it’s all a bit vague, they didn’t send me any info or anything and their website was down!!
Had another new lamb this morning. She did it all by herself as well as I went against my urge to interfere!!
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Looks grand :thumbsup: - and all the better for not being manhandled ;)