[Helen87]

Hi
I've often found the answers to my queries on this excellent forum without having to ask the question, however I have ewe who is either pulling a fast one or my dates are WAY off!
We noticed that she had milk 4 weeks ago and brought her into the barn to keep her close. That couple with the appalling weather we are having at the moment we didn't want to risk a midnight birth in wet conditions.
She had hollowed out and was breathing through gritted teeth so we thought it could be soon.
4 weeks later - Nothing! I have checked her today and she now has sticky water but no milk. Her belly is very tight and large. I have tried gently pressing a fist into her side, but can't feel a head, but I'm not really sure how hard too press so don't want to do any damage.
Could the sticky water be the start of colostrum production? She has no bag, but this is not unusual as she only bags up when she's lambed. This will be her 3rd lamb.
We were expecting her to lamb 5 weeks ago.
Is it possible she is phantoming?
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you
Helen

[Freddiesfarm]

Sticky water is normally a sign of a ewe drying up.  If it were colostrum it would be more custard like - my feeling as I read your question was that she lambed before you brought her in - I could be wrong.

I haven't heard of phantom pregnancies in sheep but then commercial farmers would never know if it happened or not.  I had the opposite this year with sheep scanned as empty lambing in some of the worst weather conditions we have ever had!

[Hellybee]

I asked my neighbour, sadly she said that perhaps she slipped them   I hope the ewe will be ok

[Helen87]

Thank you for your replies.
I'm 99.99% certain that she hadn't lambed before we brought her in. We were checking her daily and weekly for milk before she came and walked the field looking for evidence. Our other ewe surprised us and lambed very early but the evidence was still there 3 days later (blood on wool). However I admit there is always that possibility that we may have missed it as she does give birth very quickly. She has been in confinement for a month now so no chance of missing it during this time. It may be a case of we'll never know and chalk it up to experience.
She is in excellent health but probably missing her companions.
Very frustrating......

[jembo]

We had a ewe that had a phantom pregnancy. She had milk and was as large as the others but no lamb appeared. This was back in february and she was kept in for an extra 4 weeks. She had lambed several times before and usually twins so not sure what went wrong this time.   

[Helen87]

Hi Jembo
Thank you for your reply. It does sound a very similar situation, we are trying to think how we could have missed her lambing, it's obviously not impossible but there was no evidence. She did have a very small lamb last year that needed a colostrum boost to get it going. We think it was premature. So she may well have sneaked one out and walked away. At least we know phantoming is possible...
Hope you have better luck next year.

[jembo]

Luckily it was not one of my ewes it was one of the farms I was lambing for earlier this year. I will also have a look in one of my books and see if it says anything.