Triplet Lambs

yessam

I got my sheep scanned last saturday. They are due to lamb around 1st of March. The scan results show a good crop of lambs - a rate of 2.1 lambs per ewe. My worry is that I have 32 sets of triplets. Now I often had a few triplets and would always be trying to adopt one of the lambs on to another ewe, but this can be serious hassle, especially when I am very busy lambing and calving. Has anyone any beter-easier way of managing these triplets, assuming they are born alive.

Any one interested in buying them..

reilig

yessam wrote: »

I got my sheep scanned last saturday. They are due to lamb around 1st of March. The scan results show a good crop of lambs - a rate of 2.1 lambs per ewe. My worry is that I have 32 sets of triplets. Now I often had a few triplets and would always be trying to adopt one of the lambs on to another ewe, but this can be serious hassle, especially when I am very busy lambing and calving. Has anyone any beter-easier way of managing these triplets, assuming they are born alive.

Any one interested in buying them..

Sounds like a good crop of lambs. There is no reason why the ewes will not rear the triplets if they are fed right. You need to start feeding your ewes rolled oats now. This will toughen up the lambs inside the ewes and ensure that the ewes aren't too thin when they lamb (triplets take a lot out of ewes, oats won't fatten the lamb in the ewe, but will help the ewe put fat on her own back which she will need later). When the lambs are born, you will need to start feeding the ewes a good high protein feed that will help them to produce more milk. You will need to lamb your ewes inside or you risk losing lambs to the fox. Again, there is no reason why the ewes cannot raise the 3 lambs if you feed them right. Sounds like you are already feeding them right, because if you weren't, you wouldn't be getting such a good crop of lambs.

Cran

as said above should be able to rear them if kept separate from the rest and feed. hard to beat adoption though, have them beside the singles when single lambs take away the one lamb cover the triplet with a little after birth and salt after ewes starts licking the adoption put her own lamb back in... must have adopted 40 triplets this way last year, did end up with 10 triplets rearing the lambs still though

johngalway

reilig wrote: »

You will need to lamb your ewes inside or you risk losing lambs to the fox.

Drop over to the Hunting section under Sports > Shooting > Hunting if ye're having trouble with foxes, plenty of lads over there capable of sorting out problem foxes properly

eorna

If ewes are young and/or healthy they will rear them alright if fed properly. Adopt any spare triplet lamb from older, thinner, wrecked ewe, and if healthy and fit leave them and feed them.
You would probably save a bit of hassle without too many looses.

sea12

Never heard that about rolled Oats before. I have always fed Glanbia Ewe and Lamb ration and mixed in some rolled barley to it.
Just wondering would rolled oats be better to add in before they lamb?

elius

johngalway wrote: »

Drop over to the Hunting section under Sports > Shooting > Hunting if ye're having trouble with foxes, plenty of lads over there capable of sorting out problem foxes properly

Im in meath.

yessam

How much rolled oats should I start feeding then now as they are not lambing until at least 1st March and they are in goo condition and lots of good silage available to them. Why is rolled oats better for them over some ewe and lamb nuts.