[bumpkins]

Hi 
We have a little flock of 10 Jacobs.  Imagine our horror when we saw one bumbling around this morning, crashing into the fences obviously totally unable to see.  To cut a long story short, the vet came out later on to have a look and said that she and several others had conjunctivitis which can cause temporary blindness.  He has treated them all (injections into the eyelids....!) and said that they should be fine.   We're still quite new to keeping sheep and apart from the occasional dodgy leg (sheep - not us!) we haven't had any problems.  I just wondered if anyone else has had experience of eye troubles with their sheep and if it cleared up ok.  Thanks a lot.

[moony]

We have had pink eye for a couple of months. Some have had eyes that look like they are about to pop. Had a few completely blind for a few days to a week but all have recovered their sight, although some have taken longer than others. It has been an absolute pain to get rid of though, especially at tupping time. We still have it reappearing now so have scattered them over the whole acreage to try and stop them touching each other.

[Helen Wiltshire Horn]

Mine have had pink-eye a lot as well.  We seem to have bouts of it from about May to September, making me think that it might be spread by flies.  It is a complete pain to treat as it requires vigilance as it seems to be very painful and gets quite bad quickly.  I inject them with Alamycin LA and put Orbenin in the affected eye and it clears up quite quickly.  I wish that there was some way of preventing it.
Helen

[devonlady]

It will clear up on it's own if not treated though you must do your best for them. Brolene eye drops I find work well, from the chemist and a lot cheaper. have only had it twice in 30 years.

[FiB]

Is conjunctivitis different to pink eye? I read that pink eye could lead to permanant blindness.... We had a case of it (pink eye) 2 weeks ago but cleared upretty quickly with eye ointment from the vet