[Bionic]

One of my twins has an eye problem, They eye itself looks cloudy and I am not sure that she isn't blind in that eye.
I want to take her to the vets in the morning. She is 2.5 weeks old. Can I take her on her own in a box/dog crate, or will mum and sister need to come too in the trailer?
Its a half an hour journey each way so we will probably be away about 1.5 hours in total.

[kaz]

Sally, You don't need to take her in the trailer, just take her by herself in the dog crate will do. She probably has inturned eyelashes. Depending on the vet she'll have some sort of treatment for this along with some eye cream as it is probably very sore.

[bigchicken]

I would take just the lamb should be ok on her own for the short time she will be away from mum, Or could you not talk to your vet over the phone describing the problem.

[Bionic]

Thanks both of you.  I think it probably is turned in eyelid.
Bigchicken, call me a coward but as a novice I don't trust myself and would be happier if the vet sees her. So off we go in the morning with the dog crate.

[Remy]

Very often when sheep/lambs get eye infections the eye clouds over and turns blue, but they will return to normal once the infection clears up, unless it's been extremely severe - and even then it can clear.


About half my flock got contagious eye infections last summer, I thought they were all going blind!  Some of their eyes were horrendous, and I was convinced they had lost their sight but all recovered 100% except for one ram lamb who has a faint blue tinge to his eyes but he sees perfectly.


Fingers crossed your lamb is fine 

[Anke]

Could also just be an eye infection, or entropion - if entropion vet will probably staple eyelid and apply orbenin, if just eye infection orbenin by itself.
 
dog crate will be fine - that's how our lambs/kids travel until too big. I would however take the second twin too, just to make sure s/he hasn't the same problem, just not too obvious yet.

[Pedwardine]

It's always worth having some Orbenin handy for conditions like this. We always have a couple of tubes handy. Great for all animals.

[Blinkers]

Ryelands and Southdowns are notorious for Entropion - I didn;t have any last year for the first time, but got one again this year.....its easily sorted, don't worry.  And lamby will be fine in a dog crate as Kaz said.   

[Bionic]

Well we got there and back ok. She made a tremendous noise in the car but was as good as gold in the surgery.
Yes, it was Entropian of the bottom lid. Vet injected penecilin into it and also put some ointment in her eye. We have to repeat the ointment in 3 days time.
The eye looks awful at the moment, one of those things that makes you squint yourself when you look at it    but she seems fine 

[suziequeue]

Did she bond straight back with Mum?

We have a lamb that we might have to take into town and we are hesitant in case Mum rejects him on return.

We wouldn't be away for more than an hour and he is a week old now.

[Mammyshaz]

Glad she's back home and none the worse for her ordeal 

[Bionic]

Suzuiequeue, you wouldn't know she had been away. I got the food out and everyone carried on as normal. Mine will be 3 weeks old on Wed.

[suziequeue]

Glad to hear that Sally. Our little one seems to have picked up a bit so fingers crossed :-))

[Marches Farmer]

Ryelands and Southdowns are notorious for Entropion - I didn;t have any last year for the first time, but got one again this year.....its easily sorted, don't worry.

What SD bloodlines have this?  We've seen one case in around 600 lambs.

[jaykay]

Ha, I had exactly this issue yesterday.

I took my gimmer lamb (1.5 days old) zipped inside my work jacket - tied the cord at the bottom of the jacket tight and her head stuck out out the neck by mine. Left me my hands free to drive and she snugged down and went to sleep. In fact, we left her in there while the vet looked at her eye, since it stopped her wriggling too much 

I suppose we were away from mum and twin for half-an-hour and they all got back together straight away.