General sheep thread

farawaygrass

arctictree wrote: »

Lads, anyone know if one of those adoption gates would work on a ewe lamb that won't let her lamb suck? Otherwise she wants her lamb and roars when it's taken away. She has good milk.

I don’t know, I need to get one for next year, but I had a hogget that was as wild as I ever saw and wouldn’t let her lamb suck. I made a rope halter and tied her for a couple of days. She is in the shed loose now and the lamb isn’t hungry. Hopefully when she goes to grass she’ll still let him suck. Might be worth trying

arctictree

farawaygrass wrote: »

I don’t know, I need to get one for next year, but I had a hogget that was as wild as I ever saw and wouldn’t let her lamb suck. I made a rope halter and tied her for a couple of days. She is in the shed loose now and the lamb isn’t hungry. Hopefully when she goes to grass she’ll still let him suck. Might be worth trying

I tied her up there for half an hour and the lamb was sucking away. I'll try that a few times today and see what happens. Maybe she just isn't used to the idea of a lamb sucking....

farawaygrass

arctictree wrote: »

I tied her up there for half an hour and the lamb was sucking away. I'll try that a few times today and see what happens. Maybe she just isn't used to the idea of a lamb sucking....

I left her tied full time for a couple of days, I just left the rope long enough that she could eat and drink

Kevhog1988

arctictree wrote: »

I tied her up there for half an hour and the lamb was sucking away. I'll try that a few times today and see what happens. Maybe she just isn't used to the idea of a lamb sucking....

put a dog in the pen beside her if you can. seems to increase the mothering instinct in them.

DJ98

What sort of mortality rates are you experiencing this year? Lambing has finished here and in total 1 ewe and almost 10% of lambs have died. This seems exceptionally high but I can't pin point what exactly went wrong. Lost a couple of lambs due to their size and taking to long to get them out, had a triplet ewe lay on her 3 lambs and a few cases of watery mouth. The watery mouth is unusual as the lambs got Spectam at birth and all pens were limed and got fresh straw after each ewe. Another issue that popped up this year was ewes early in play not having much milk or only milk on one side. Sheep are great when they work with you but when they go against you and start dying, you'd have to question is it worth it at all.

J.O. Farmer

DJ98 wrote: »

What sort of mortality rates are you experiencing this year? Lambing has finished here and in total 1 ewe and almost 10% of lambs have died. This seems exceptionally high but I can't pin point what exactly went wrong. Lost a couple of lambs due to their size and taking to long to get them out, had a triplet ewe lay on her 3 lambs and a few cases of watery mouth. The watery mouth is unusual as the lambs got Spectam at birth and all pens were limed and got fresh straw after each ewe. Another issue that popped up this year was ewes early in play not having much milk or only milk on one side. Sheep are great when they work with you but when they go against you and start dying, you'd have to question is it worth it at all.

10% sounds high but what sort of numbers have you. If you only have 50 lambs 5 lambs is 10%, if you have 1,000 lambs it's 100.

Everyone loses a couple so at 50 losing 2 would have you at 4% already. You've identified a couple of problems though so maybe try to find the route cause.

The lambs were too big, why? Overfed ewes, a particular ram, small ewes, some other reason.

charolais0153

J.O. Farmer wrote: »

10% sounds high but what sort of numbers have you. If you only have 50 lambs 5 lambs is 10%, if you have 1,000 lambs it's 100.

Everyone loses a couple so at 50 losing 2 would have you at 4% already. You've identified a couple of problems though so maybe try to find the route cause.

The lambs were too big, why? Overfed ewes, a particular ram, small ewes, some other reason.

Depends on the scanning rate too , more trebles, more losses, from scanning rate we are Def at 10% already, will be more at selling . A lot of them I could do nothing about, ewes lambing down with foetuses , or rotten lambs , had a quad die before lambing, tahts 4 lambs gone, a lamb or two smothered in the sac, an odd one dead coming, a lot of lambs dead and not much I could do about

J.O. Farmer

charolais0153 wrote: »

Depends on the scanning rate too , more trebles, more losses, from scanning rate we are Def at 10% already, will be more at selling . A lot of them I could do nothing about, ewes lambing down with foetuses , or rotten lambs , had a quad die before lambing, tahts 4 lambs gone, a lamb or two smothered in the sac, an odd one dead coming, a lot of lambs dead and not much I could do about

I'm similar in that there were lambs dead on arrival, it happens and I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

I've only about 40 ewes so 10% mortality is easily hit most years especially if you count lambs that go with a dead ewe.

I do wonder about the target mortality rates and is that based lambs born alive that die after or is it a numbers game and if you have hundreds of ewes you might still only have a similar number of total dead lambs but because there's a bigger total the percentage is lower.

Dickie10

here goes my decent luck, probably had the best mortality since I started 8 years ago, although lost 2 ewes ,out of 178 lambs born i lost 4 from 97 ewes lambed, lost ewe with twins probably rotten in her. and ewe died a day after lambing good twins. so far hoggets have 4 lamed with 5 lambs with them , waiting for bad luck to start !

wrangler

J.O. Farmer wrote: »

I'm similar in that there were lambs dead on arrival, it happens and I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

I've only about 40 ewes so 10% mortality is easily hit most years especially if you count lambs that go with a dead ewe.

I do wonder about the target mortality rates and is that based lambs born alive that die after or is it a numbers game and if you have hundreds of ewes you might still only have a similar number of total dead lambs but because there's a bigger total the percentage is lower.

mortality rates is based on losses from scanning to weaning

arctictree

I've lost a good few lambs this year from just being too small at birth from a group of 50 hoggets. All the singles were just on good hay. Some huge and some tiny and dying.

wrangler

arctictree wrote: »

I've lost a good few lambs this year from just being too small at birth from a group of 50 hoggets. All the singles were just on good hay. Some huge and some tiny and dying.

Did they get toxovax and enzovax, you should bring afterbirths and dead lambs to a lab, it sounds like toxo because of the vermin in hay. Hay probably isn't good enough on its own, were they on grass as well. They should've got ration for the energy, protein and minerals that it has.

joe35

Mortality seems low here this year, still early so don't want to jinx it. We do seem to have a good few lambs not thriving the way they should. One spin drying up seems to be the problem. Ewes in good form on a 19%ration, one spin is just a bit firm with little milk. Doesn't seem like mastitis though

joe35

Two lambs are still the same with what looks like arthritis

farawaygrass

Lamb Mortality normal here all considering, thought I was facing into a sh1tstorm with toxo but thankfully it was minor enough.
Ewe mortality wasn’t as high in a long time though. Over 4%. Lost 4 triplet bearing ewes from prolapsing and 3 from infections which I am linking to toxo. Almost have another 4% of ewes running without lambs-found a few slipped but others must have been reabsorbed.
Weather came ok which was a big help.
Found lambs weren’t thriving a bit last week. Was thinking of cutting meal to the ewes last weekend but will keep it going another week at least. Was grazing a fields with nasty enough grass to try clean it up but they are back on Nice grass now too.
Onwards and upwards!!

arctictree

3rd ewe in a row now that won't take her lamb. What the hell is up with this group. They are half Llyen and half suffock, 1 year olds. Driving me mental!

wrangler

farawaygrass wrote: »

Lamb Mortality normal here all considering, thought I was facing into a sh1tstorm with toxo but thankfully it was minor enough.
Ewe mortality wasn’t as high in a long time though. Over 4%. Lost 4 triplet bearing ewes from prolapsing and 3 from infections which I am linking to toxo. Almost have another 4% of ewes running without lambs-found a few slipped but others must have been reabsorbed.
Weather came ok which was a big help.
Found lambs weren’t thriving a bit last week. Was thinking of cutting meal to the ewes last weekend but will keep it going another week at least. Was grazing a fields with nasty enough grass to try clean it up but they are back on Nice grass now too.
Onwards and upwards!!

Ewes rearing twins need 2kg Dry Matter/day or the equivalent of 2kgs meal/ nuts. If they have 3 -4 inches of good spring grass it'll supply that, if not I'd be slow to reduce meal

charolais0153

wrangler wrote: »

Ewes rearing twins need 2kg Dry Matter/day or the equivalent of 2kgs meal/ nuts. If they have 3 -4 inches of good spring grass it'll supply that, if not I'd be slow to reduce meal

How meal are you feeding

wrangler

charolais0153 wrote: »

How meal are you feeding

Not feeding any meal to the lambed ewes, we've good grass here but we'll feed if the grass goes

wrangler

arctictree wrote: »

3rd ewe in a row now that won't take her lamb. What the hell is up with this group. They are half Llyen and half suffock, 1 year olds. Driving me mental!

Very surprising for lleyns but you're not the first I've heard of suffolks doing it

farawaygrass

wrangler wrote: »

Ewes rearing twins need 2kg Dry Matter/day or the equivalent of 2kgs meal/ nuts. If they have 3 -4 inches of good spring grass it'll supply that, if not I'd be slow to reduce meal[/quot
They are getting nice quality grass now, all fresh and being moved every couple of days. Also getting ad lib silage (they aren’t really eating a whole lot of it tbh) and getting .4kg of meal. Started measuring grass this year too and using pasture base so learning as I go with that.
Some of the sheep ain’t even too bothered with the nuts anymore which id say Is a good sign.
Lambs looked a bit poor today but weather wasn’t nice at all. They should push on with a bit of nice weather again.
That’s all the plan anyhow!

wrangler

farawaygrass wrote: »

wrangler wrote: »

Ewes rearing twins need 2kg Dry Matter/day or the equivalent of 2kgs meal/ nuts. If they have 3 -4 inches of good spring grass it'll supply that, if not I'd be slow to reduce meal[/quot
They are getting nice quality grass now, all fresh and being moved every couple of days. Also getting ad lib silage (they aren’t really eating a whole lot of it tbh) and getting .4kg of meal. Started measuring grass this year too and using pasture base so learning as I go with that.
Some of the sheep ain’t even too bothered with the nuts anymore which id say Is a good sign.
Lambs looked a bit poor today but weather wasn’t nice at all. They should push on with a bit of nice weather again.
That’s all the plan anyhow!

Grass is the best, trying to feed ewes with young lambs can be difficult in a big group

Green farmer

wrangler wrote: »

Very surprising for lleyns but you're not the first I've heard of suffolks doing it

Think you that mentioned it before that the lleyn cross Suffolk ain't a good mix. Had the odd one here before and not sure its the best mix either. Never had a issue with Lleyn cross texel though.

farawaygrass

Horrible weather on lambs now this evening through to tomorrow morning, wind and rain. A lot of humpy backs

charolais0153

farawaygrass wrote: »

Horrible weather on lambs now this evening through to tomorrow morning, wind and rain. A lot of humpy backs

You wouldn't be long seeing a few hungry ones.

Birdnuts

farawaygrass wrote: »

Horrible weather on lambs now this evening through to tomorrow morning, wind and rain. A lot of humpy backs

Lambing due to kick of my end after Easter and the outlook from MT on the weather forum is grim to say the least:(

farawaygrass

Birdnuts wrote: »

Lambing due to kick of my end after Easter and the outlook from MT on the weather forum is grim to say the least:(

Must be the only year where the weather was better in late February than in will be early April for lambing.
On the positive-every day that passes for you you are a lot nearer better weather. If it was February it Would still be a long slog until weather would typically improve.

Green farmer

Birdnuts wrote: »

Lambing due to kick of my end after Easter and the outlook from MT on the weather forum is grim to say the least:(

I had a look at the long range monthly forecast on met eireann and they aren't flagging anything extreme or out of normal for next few weeks. Seems settled enough outlook.

Young95

How’s are the outdoor lambing men getting on with the weather . Started here on Thursday and everything is being brought in once Lambed. Rain and wind is cruel .

wrangler

Green farmer wrote: »

I had a look at the long range monthly forecast on met eireann and they aren't flagging anything extreme or out of normal for next few weeks. Seems settled enough outlook.

Supposed to be improving from tomorrow, up to 16 degrees so there'll be grass growing as well