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United Suffolk Sheep Association |
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December/January 2003/2004 Question Question: "How do you handle ewe and lamb management in late gestation and early lactation?" Answer: A.
Richard Cobb Producers should know when their ewes can begin to lamb. To do so, just write down the day you turned the ram with your ewes, or, the day your ewe was actually mated. Be ready for lambs 140 days after the date you first turned the ram in. Have your birthing area cleaned and ready, in a draft free area of your barn. Shear the ewes prior to lambing if possible as it makes the whole process go smoother. The barn will be dryer and the ewes more easily observed as birthing approaches. Do not over crowd the ewes that will lamb. Be sure that all ewes can eat at the same time to reduce injury due to ewes fighting for space. Have lambing jugs set up to put the ewe and her lambs in after the lambs are born. Having all the supplies you think you will need on hand and close by prior to the start of the lambing season will help save more lambs for you. Allow our ewes to lamb in the large lambing area if possible rather than putting them in jugs when they begin to labor. Research has shown that the moving of a ewe to another pen once she has started the lambing process can make her stop lambing while she investigates the new pen and delay the birth of the lamb for a period of time. Once a ewe is in the birthing process, observe her for signs of progress or non progress and help her only if you feel she needs help. The entire birthing process is important for the health of the lamb as well as the well being of the ewe. A healthy newborn lamb will adjust to its new surroundings quickly. It will raise its head and shake it vigorously, clearing any mucous from the nostril area. Producers can help clear mucous from the nose of the lamb by running their hand down the face and over the nose to push fluid off the head. If a lamb seems slow to breath, massage it or gently push a piece of straw or hay up the nostril. This will stimulate the lamb to sneeze and cough and to shake its head, which encourages the lamb to breathe. As long as the birthing area is dry and draft free, allow the ewe to mother her lamb in that area. Unless there is a need to move the ewe and lambs immediately, allow them to interact with each other before moving them. Use the maternal instinct of the ewe when moving her. Simply pick up her lamb or lambs and holding them at her eye height, back away keeping the lambs between you and the mother. Most ewes will follow, but if she doesn’t, put one or both of the lambs down and hold them by a rear leg. This will increase the chances that the lamb will bleat and so get the attention of the ewe. Once she moves forward, allow her to smell the lamb and then back up again. Be sure to maintain contact with the ewe so that she will follow. Remember, the ewe has chosen the spot to lamb and so she has an emotional attachment to it, but once you she has started to move, you can usually lead her slowly across the lambing area and into a lambing pen. Before leaving the ewe and her lamb in the jug, do the Clip, Dip and Strip procedure. This means, Clip, using a pair of scissors, the navel chord of the lamb within 2 inches of it’s body; Dip the clipped navel in 7% iodine; and Strip the teats of the ewe to make sure she has milk and that the teat canals are open. Make sure the ewe has water, preferably warm for the first few hours, and leave her and the lambs alone. Anyone that is handling a young lamb should stick a finger into the mouth of the lamb each time you pick it up. Because the normal body temperature of a healthy lamb is warmer than a person’s, the mouth should feel hot to you. If it is not hot, you need to make an evaluation of why it is not. This is almost always due to a lack of milk or exposure to cold or drafty condition is a very young lamb. If the mouth is not hot but warm, get the lamb and it’s mother to a draft free area as soon as possible and make sure it gets Colostrum. If the mouth is cool, you need to get milk into the lamb and to warm it up. If the mouth is cold, you need to warm the lamb up before giving it milk. Be sure the lambing jug you put the ewe and her lambs in is large enough that she can move around and not step on the lambs and that it is “escape proof”. Escape proof means the lambs cannot get out of the pen and run of and get separated from the ewe. The lambing pen is a place where the ewe and her lambs can get to know each other. This is important because a lamb does not know or care who its mother is at first. The instinct of the lamb is to stand and nurse and it will nurse any ewe that allows it to do so. Once they can stand lambs quickly become mobile and may wander off or be stolen by ewes that are within a day or so of lambing and have very strong maternal instincts. Being confined allows the lambs to bond with their mother and allows her to teach them that “this is where you come to nurse”. Identify and treat your lambs using the system you feel most comfortable with. By that I mean, identify the lambs by day one or two and give a Bo-Se shot if your area is deficient in Selenium and if you do not have Selenium in your mineral mixture. Dock the lambs within the first week of birth as it will be less stressful to the lambs at that age and before the tail has a chance to grow very large. Castrate the lambs if necessary according to you program. Lambs can be docked and castrated while they are still in the lambing jugs or after they are turned out, whichever best fits your program. Observe all sheep as often as you are in the barn each day. You cannot look at them too much. Observe the mothers to see if they are limping or refusing to let lambs nurse. This can be a sign of developing Mastitis. Pick up each lamb in the lambing pens and check its temperature using your finger or a thermometer. Walk among each group of older lambs. Make each lamb stand up at least twice a day. Observe what the lamb does when it stands. A healthy lamb will stand up and stretch, just like we do when we first get up. A hungry lamb will not stand and stretch but will immediately run toward a ewe and attempt to nurse. If you have such a lamb, you need to find out why it is hungry. Ask yourself questions like: Does the ewe have enough milk for two lambs? Does the ewe have both sides of her udder, or only one side? Is one teat canal plugged? Does the ewe have mastitis? Does she reject the hungry lamb and refuse to let if nurse? IS the ewe stupid or crazy? How you answer the questions you think of will determine the treatment of the lamb. Leave the ewe and lambs in the lambing pen until they seem to be thriving together and then move them to a mixing pen of 3-5 other ewes and their lambs. This will allow the lambs to become accustomed to being around other ewes. Observe this group closely and return any lamb that is not thriving to a lambing pen with its mother and sibling. Sometimes a lamb may get separated from its mother even in a small group and this will help get it back on its feet. Be sure to observe if the mother accepts it and if she does then often putting them in a small area will help the lamb get back to feeling well. If she does not accept the lamb they you will have to make other plans. Once the animals in the mixing pen seem to be doing well, put them in the main group of ewes and lambs. Try to keep the ages of lambs in any group within a couple of weeks. This will make it easier to wean all lambs in the group at the same time and will reduce the cost of feeding the ewes. Set up a creep feeder in a warm sunny area in your barn. Make the area as attractive as possible to the lambs. Hanging a light bulb over the pen can help attract them to the area. If the creep is large enough, use straw bales to build a small pyramid. Lambs love to climb and to play King of the Mountain and so they will frequent the creep often. Use whichever feed you feel works best for your program. There are many quality commercial products as well as home raised formulas that work very well. Monitor the creep at least daily. Be sure all feeders are clean and free of manure etc. Any feed that is damaged or removed from the creep can be mixed in the ewe feed and fed to them. If you use self feeders for your creep, clean the throats of the feeders everyday so that clean feed is available to the lambs at all times. Raise the self feeders up using cinder blocks as the lambs grow so they do not have to bend down too far to eat and also to keep the throats of the feeder from becoming soiled by lambs putting their feet in them or defecating in them. Once the lambs are in the main group of ewes and lambs continue to observe them as often as possible. If you can, restrict access to the pens to yourself and people the animals are familiar with. New people or more than one or two walking among the lambs will be a new experience for them and can cause a panic reaction therefore increasing the chances of them getting hurt. Wean your lambs when it best fits your program. Most show or purebred lambs are weaned at around 60 days of age. If this fits your program then do so, but if it does not fit, there is not reason that the lambs have to be weaned at that time. Paul G. Eness, DVM Dr Eness is a retired Veterinarian who taught clinical medicine at Iowa State University for 28 years. His specialty was food animal medicine. He has raised Suffolk sheep for 35 years, currently maintaining a flock of 60 registered ewes. He have always stressed performance and carcass traits and has participated in NSIP since 1988. Health Care of New Born Lambs No period is more important in the sheep production cycle than lambing time. We all know this is when most deaths occur. The costliness of these deaths becomes apparent when one considers that it costs $50.00 to carry a ewe from one lambing to the next. This means we have $50.00 in costs in the new born single lamb. If live twins are born the cost against these lambs is approximately $25.00 each. If one of these lambs dies that cost at birth is back to $50.00 for the survivor. This simple math stresses the importance of saving all the lambs we can. Husbandry at lambing time is more important than medicine. There is the tendency on the part of many producers to put too many needles into healthy lambs. Early abundant colostrum intake is one of the most important husbandry practices to be followed at lambing time. Most lambs have a powerful sucking instinct within minutes of birth. I help lambs find a teat as soon as possible. Once a lamb nurses it will rarely need to be tubed later, although stomach tubes can be helpful in saving those lambs that are weak or do not have a strong sucking instinct. The lamb that gets a good start with a stomach full of colostrum can tolerate a cold environment. I help the ewes dry their lambs using towels or a hair dryer. I have seen more lambs killed by heat lamps than saved by them. Lambs dry, and with adequate colostrum/milk intake, will thrive in a cold environment if kept dry and well bedded. Pneumonia is less of a threat under those conditions than under warmer humid conditions. I don’t routinely give antibiotics to prevent pneumonia. At the earliest sign of lethargy or respiratory stress I take the animals temperature. A digital thermometer is a necessity. Lambs with pneumonia typically carry a temperature of 1040 F. or more. Naxcell®, Excenel® and Mycotil® are antibiotics that are effective in treating pneumonia. I don’t use Mycotil® routinely on baby lambs because the dosage is so critical. If this drug is used on baby lambs one should use a small syringe such as a tuberculin syringe so dosage can be accurately calibrated (1/4 cc per 16# lamb). Overdose can be fatal and accidental injection to humans can be fatal as well. I usually work alone and find elastrator bands the easiest way to dock and castrate. I try to do these procedures when lambs are 2-3 days old. If ewes have received a booster dose of enterotoxemia type C and D and tetanus toxoid two weeks before the start of lambing their lambs will receive enough antibodies through colostrum to protect them against these diseases until they are 4-6 weeks old. At that time they will need to receive their first CD & T vaccination. This must be followed with a second dose 3 weeks later. Ewe Problems at Lambing The major ewe problems I see are pregnancy toxemia before lambing and mastitis and acidosis in the nursing ewe. Pregnancy toxemia or ketosis must be suspected in ewes in late pregnancy that exhibit a loss of appetite. I have good success treating these with propylene glycol. Success is dependent upon treating at the very first sign of appetite failure. Oral treatment with 2 ounces 2-3 times daily will often result in a reversal of symptoms. As the appetite returns the dosage of propylene glycol can be gradually reduced. If the ewe is down more intensive treatment including IV glucose and induced lambing may be indicated. Post lambing loss of appetite is most often associated with having increased concentrate consumption too rapidly after lambing. When this occurs, grain intake must be drastically reduced and the animal treated with an oral antacid. Two ounces of sodium bicarbonate in two quarts of warm water can be most easily administered using a calf esophageal tube feeder. This should be repeated in 12-24 hours. The first consideration in cases of mastitis must be the supplementation of her lambs so they do not starve. Prognosis for saving the affected udder is generally guarded, depending on the bacteria causing the mastitis. The lives of many ewes with clinical mastitis may be saved by treatment with Mycotil® injected subcutaneously at the prescribed dose of 1 ½ cc per 100# bodyweight. Close observation and early treatment are the important factors in successfully overcoming most health problems in sheep. Rex Quam Up in the state of Minnesota we shear our ewes in early November. The main reasons for shearing this time of year for us it to body score the ewes, keep the buildings cleaner and so the lambs have an easier time of finding the teat. If we have a few thin ewes we will sort them off, give them more grain and better quality hay to bring them back in shape. This allows the ewes to get a little wool growth back before it gets real cold. Our brood ewes are fed a round bale of a grass/alfalfa mix hay free choice and 1-2 pounds of a 12% grain mix a day until they are 2 weeks away from lambing. Ewes will also have access to water out of a clean automatic waterer, mineral and salt free choice. This year we are short on the hay supply and the ewes are in good shape so we put a corn stalk bale out for the ewes to fill up on and have a nice place to lie outside. We will worm the ewes around Thanksgiving time. We also have Carol Dodge pregnancy checks on our ewes around Thanksgiving time so we can get the ewes in the lambing barn a couple of weeks prior to lambing. At this time the ewes get fed better quality hay and 2-3 pounds of a 14% grain mix. After a ewe lambs we put the ewe and her lambs in a 5’ by 6’ well bedded lambing jug, spray the navel of the lambs with Iodine, strip some milk out of the ewe to make sure her udder is OK, get the lambs sucking to get colostrum into the lambs and give a squirt or two of Pipestone Baby Strength. We then let the lamb suck s little more and spray the navel again with Iodine. If the lambs don’t suck we will either tube them or give them colostrum out of a bottle. We will check the ewe and newborn lambs often during the first 2 days of their life. If we can get the lambs off to a good start we have very little trouble later on. If we are having trouble with the lambs scouring at a young age we will give the lambs a squirt of spectam scour halt before we do any of these procedures. It is very important to give the ewes fresh water immediately after the lambs have sucked. Very little grain is fed to the ewes for the first couple of days after lambing. If it is a tough birth or the ewe looks a little weak, we will give them some Banimine and Penicillin for a couple of days to help relieve some of the stress. If the lambs and the ewe are doing well at a couple of days old we tag the lambs, put a band on the tail and give a C/D & T shot. We bring the ewes up slowly on the grain and give them good quality hay at this time. They will then be put into a small mixing pen with 5-8 other ewes for a week or so. In this pen we have a creep area set up with a heat lamp on to help the lambs find the creep area. If they take this move ok we will move the ewes and lambs out to a pole shed and will have up to 20-25 ewes and their lambs in a group. The lambs will have a well-bedded creep area with a 20% starter and a heat lamp. This building is a little colder and the lambs seem to hang out together around the heat lamp quite a bit of the time. As lambs get 3 weeks old we will also offer some 3rd crop hay to them. If it is really cold the hay will be offered sooner. We then give the lambs another shot of C/D & T. When the youngest lamb in the pen is 40 days old, we take all grain away from the ewes and feed them poor quality hay for a week. This will drop the milk production of the ewe and the lambs will drastically increase the amount of starter feed at this time. Between 45-50 days of age the lambs will be weaned. We keep the lambs in the same area as they are used to being in to help with the stress of weaning. At this time we will give the lambs the same feed as they were getting and put some Bovine Bluelite in the water for 5 days to help with the stress of weaning. Last year after the 5 days of Bluelite we took 2 days off, then hit them with a treatment dose of Corrid in the water for 5 days. This really helped clean up some of the loose stools we had at the time. Some of the things we do on our farm are for convenience due to off the farm jobs and may not be the best for your operations. If you have any suggestions or questions feel free to email me at rjquam@lakes.com. Glen Erickson Nothing else can have a greater impact on the success or the failure of a profitable lambing season than proper management of the ewe flock. Proper management may include different aspects depending on what area of the country you live in, the resources available to you and the overall type of management system that is effective for you. Not every thing works for everyone in every situation. You need to take all the ideas that you hear and adapt the ones you can use and apply them to your type of management. There are a few basic things that need consideration in every plan. In late gestation, nutrition is probably the most important factor. Ewes should condition scored or evaluated to determine their body condition. Looks can be deceiving here, especially ewes that are in long wool; they can look to be in good condition but can be quite thin. You must put your hands on the sheep and FEEL the body condition. We do this early enough to allow poorer conditioned ewes enough time to gain sufficient body weight to avoid problems in late gestation. Ewes that are too thin, or in some cases too fat, are hot prospects for pregnancy disease. If possible, ewes should be separated into groups and fed to meet their needs. We feed the ewes enough to gain some weight and maintain proper nutrient levels but not so much that we creep feed the lambs inside the ewe. This can lead to some major problems at lambing time, not only with extra big lambs, but also extra fat ewes can have blockage of the birth canal. If the ewes are sheared just prior to lambing they will require more than the usual feed, especially if the weather is cold. Properly conditioned ewes will be better milkers and better able to care for their lambs than ewes that are too thin or too fat. Six weeks before lambing the ewes are given a booster shot of clostridium type C&D and are dewormed. At this time they are once again screened for poorer doing ewes that need extra feed. Depending on the time of year and climate we shear the ewes four weeks prior to lambing. If the ewes have access to shelter and the weather is not bitter cold, we will shear the flock in early January for a late January-February lambing. Shearing allows us to house more ewes in less space, use far less bedding, and increase lamb survival (lambs can find the teats sooner and easier and we have far less lambs laid on). Exercise is a vital part of the daily routine in late gestation. Feed the ewes in one area and provide water in another area, far apart, so that ewes have to walk back and forth. This exercise will not only tone muscles for easy delivery and reduce lambing problems but will give you a good opportunity to observe ewes that lag behind or are low in energy (these are the first signs of pregnancy disease). Breeding dates are kept on all the ewes. This allows us to separate the ewes out from the main flock one week before they are due and bring them up to the barn for closer watch. We can concentrate our time and efforts on the ewes closest to lambing and not worry about the rest of the ewes. When the ewes begin to lamb they are observed from a distance and given time to lamb on their own (approximately one hour from the appearance of a water bag). After this time has lapsed and no progress is made, we make a quick exam to determine the problem; if everything is normal the ewe is left alone to progress. If it is determined that a problem exists it is rectified as quickly as possible and the ewe is then left to finish on her own! We pull very few lambs! Once the lambs are born the ewes are left alone for a time to mother the lambs and clean them. All ewes are checked to make sure that adequate colostrum is available and lambs are clipped and dipped with iodine. Some yearling ewes or poor mothers may need assistance to ensure that lambs nurse. Only problem ewes and their lambs are jugged up. If the ewe is taking good care of her lambs she is left alone to do her job. The ewes and lambs are watched very closely at this time in order to catch any early signs of trouble. Catching them early will give both the ewe and the lambs a better chance for a good start. Ewes and lambs that are doing well are moved to an outside pen. Ewes are grouped into pens with lambs of similar age, size and type of birth. This allows us to more adequately meet the ewe’s nutritional needs. Record keeping is very important at this time; now is the time to record any problems that you may observe so those ewes can be culled. You will not remember everything about every ewe when it is time to wean and cull. Be hard on culling your ewes and you will have a better experience next lambing season. Remember that not everything works for everyone; take the good ideas from all you read, hear and see and adapt them to your operation.
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