The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Jukes Mum on May 26, 2015, 04:18:04 pm
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>:(
I have been dithering about as to whether to Crovect the sheep or not. I spoke to my shearer who said he is not bothered either way, but would shear them first week in June for me anyway. With this in mind I brought them all in for a bottom clean* and to spray the lambs who will not be sheared.
Anyway, Mr Tup did have a rather dirty bottom so I thought I'd hand shear his wagger and around his general bottom area and I found a small area of fly strike on the top of his tail. It was smaller than a 5p piece but looked to have a fair few maggots in there and was obviously rather sore. I cleaned it and put Crovect on the area and around his back end. I have had a good rummage and can't see any other maggots anywhere.
I have cleaned all of the others up but should I do anything before they are sheared (shorn?) (hopefully next week) or just keep a really close eye on them?
Really worried :-[
*a few of them have dirty bottoms so I took some samples to the vet- v low worm count so hoping its just new grass.
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Look for frantically wagging tails, "nabbing" ie biting at their wool but, more importantly check frequently each day for fly eggs on their fleece. You will have to look closely!
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It's a good idea to clip all around the back end, the area which can potentially get filthy, in advance of the shearer coming. Often you have to remove this wool from the fleece after shearing anyway. If you are worried about flies, then spray just the cleared area, not the fleece, but of course you would then have to do the whole sheep after shearing. Definitely spray your lambs now - they are more susceptible to flies, and what's a small area on an adult sheep is much bigger on a lamb.
Don't feel too bad about the tiny patch of strike on your tup - you've found and treated it very promptly. For the rest of the flock, watch them carefully in case flies get somewhere not clipped before your shearer gets there.
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Also watch out for sheep looking at the ground then making a sudden small movement, or going off by themselves, or nibbling at a foot.
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Look for frantically wagging tails, "nabbing" ie biting at their wool but, more importantly check frequently each day for fly eggs on their fleece. You will have to look closely!
Devonlady - can you see fly eggs on the outside of the fleece? Do they lay eggs on the surface and the hatched maggots do the burrowing? I always assumed the flies laid the eggs on the skin but that makes much more sense.
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Yes, you can but you do have to look closely and several times a day as they hatch and burrow quickly.
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Thanks All. I have sprayed the lambs and clipped around the adults bottoms. I will now start the "looking at them very closely". Love having more of an excuse to just look at my sheep :innocent:
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She has a sweet face :sheep: :sheep: :sheep: :sheep:
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I think we could cope with more pics of your flock Jukes Mum - what lovely cute sheep :hugsheep:
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Is she a 'down' sweet face :sheep:
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They are rather nice sheep :-)
I could bore you all for hours with piccies :roflanim: I don't have any recent one, but here are the lambs in April.
I am also going to blatantly brag about my sheep shelter which we managed to finish just before lambing! We went for the 'rustic' look :innocent:
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Can we have some front views please :eyelashes: Their bums are lovely too but.....
That is indeed a perfect, sturdy shelter - well done. The sheep clearly love it.
I like seeing your hens wandering around amongst the sheep. Ours do that too, and we'll sometimes see a pile of hens and sheep sunbatheing together. In fact in the winter there were hens sitting on top of sheep, presumably to keep their feet warm. :sheep: :chook:
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Aw! I like the thought of that, but the hens get chased by the lambs too much to sit on them!
I will try for some front views but usually if they are coming towards me it is at 100 miles an hour!
Sorry Katrina- they are Ryelands
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We have only had 1 case of flystrike which was last year but it was inbetween the lambs shoulder blades- so worth checking that area too. In fact check the whole sheep haha! We sprayed ours with crovect last week and will go on the 6 week rule now after our lamb last year was struck on the middle of the 6th week after treatment :(
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Thanks for the heads-up Twizzel
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Definitely keep an eye on shoulder. W eve just pulled ewe lambs in, found one bum strike.
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Rank Novice Alert:
gosh, it happens REALLY quickly then?
Is there any sense in Clicking before any evidence of flies? Just to be on the safe side? We are taking delivery of our first Ryelands in 4 weeks and Im having a crisis of confidence :-\
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In a word yes. They are mighty quick workers. Prevention better than cure. When you get you lambs spray them to be on the safe side. Mind you I do really get stuck in if we find them, little bar stewards. Clizened all lamb bums today, decided against clik until shearing for them as we have some routine stuff to do first and clickzen will be safer for us to work around next week.
One lamb found with it. Crovected and he's right as rain x
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Quick fag , yes I washed my hands, and off they go up the windy headland.
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Absolutely! We spray our lambs with Crovect (don't like Clik) in May, at the beginning of the fly season in our part of the country. We would be very upset if they were already struck at that time. We watch the adults carefully just in case (in which case we would treat straight away) then spray them at shearing in June or July. By hand shearing there's enough wool to hold the product, whereas with machine shearing you need to wait a couple of weeks. Sheep are unlikely to be struck when freshly shorn, as there's nowhere for the maggots to hide, or the muck to cling.
With Crovect, spraying is repeated every 6 weeks through the fly season, but we find it's best to do the repeat dose a couple of days before the six weeks is up.
Just because the sheep and lambs have been sprayed, it doesn't mean you don't watch them carefully.
Cross posted with Hellybee
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so helpful: thank you very much X
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I ll be spraying bums in my sleep tonight nigh on 150 big n little ones lol. The only ones not done are the molliess/Cade lambs. Am knackered now so bar the bottles for the twins, I'm done, currently melding into the headboard with recorded bgt...knackered but very relieved. :excited: Oh yeah plus 50 ewe lambs sprayed.
kimbo, they're vile, a beautiful green colour, same size as big bluebottle. The are traps you can get think they're called red top? Other wise it's sprays really.
After using clik/clikzen, bar getting caught out like today, crovect is only here now as a treatment, we trust the clik products to do the job well for the rest of the summer, of course after resprays x