Sheep with sore feet

melboy

Hi,

A friend of mine new to farming purchased a few sheep {hoggets} for his small holding but has noticed that 4 or 5 of tham are limping. Does he need a vet? thanks in advance

eorna

They could have scald or foot rot, trim hooves with secators and apply some antibiotic spray. (Almacyn type), footbath with formalin does job but for 4-5 not worth the effort.

agcons

Most likely footrot. Its endemic in sheep. Years ago we used to buy hoggets for the winter, always had lame ones. Only got it under control when I persuaded my father to run them thru a footbath on arrival and once a month after that. put copper sulphate(aka bluestone) mixed with water in it. Will need to pare the more severly infected ones and spray as stated by eorna

Username John

melboy wrote: »

Hi,

A friend of mine new to farming purchased a few sheep {hoggets} for his small holding but has noticed that 4 or 5 of tham are limping. Does he need a vet? thanks in advance

I would say most likely footrot - if you only have a few, bring em in, catch them and put bluestone on them as suggested by agcons above.
This can be easily enough done without a foot bath, but a foot bath is easier it has to be said - mix bluestone with water, in a container like an old washing-up liquid / shampoo bottle, or some other container which you can use to spray into their feet. Make sure it gets in between the crubeens. Its best to leave them in a dry yard for a while after, to give it a chance to soak in.
Also - as listed above, you may need to pare their feet a bit, you can buy snips for the job, which are the best, but you could use a sharp penknife too, just be careful, you dont want to cut too deep.
FYI - if putting it on sheep, and you're turning em over to do so, be careful as you don't want get bluestone on their udders if they still have lambs sucking (I guess this doesn't directly apply to you with hoggets, just something to keep in mind for future use)

Best o luck with em.

snowman707

good advise above, just remember the foot rot bacteria can live on soil grass etc. for to 14 days, so if possible move to a field which hadn't sheep in it for a couple of weeks, will help not getting re infected

metalwood

I agree with all posters its torture when it gets into the flock, by far the most time consuming activity esp this time of year.

I used to take the easy approach just injecting but was forced to invest in a footbath last year...........money well spent.

my aproach is pare the foot inject with L.A antibiotic then through footbath then onto clean grass sheep free for a month then repeat footbath every week for 1 month it works for me.

the secret is footbath and clean grass;)