WET WEATHER -RAM LAME- suitable injection.

Bleating Lamb

Poor sheep trying to walk between puddles at moment....have a ram lame on front foot,a bit hot but its not footrot,want to get him right for tipping in a fortnight,what injection do people use that doesnt affect fertility?...had one a few years back...think it was penicillin based injection I got then..

snowman707

pen strep or betamox

it's a raised temperature other than antibiotics that usually cause infertility , can take up to 4 weeks to remedy

Wooly Admirer

snowman707 wrote: »

pen strep or betamox

it's a raised temperature other than antibiotics that usually cause infertility , can take up to 4 weeks to remedy

Correct, semen is very temperature sensitive and an increase in body temperature can kill all his semen reserves. The life cycle of semen is actually closer to 8 weeks, so if all the rams semen is killed off by a high temp then it takes quite a while for him to be ready again.

The foot problem might not be too bad however and may not have affected him too bad. My biggest worry would be his mobility, if he's struggling to keep up with ewes then he may let some of them slip. I would be spraying him daily/every two days and feeding him well for the next two weeks to help him get over it.

Raddle his chest when he goes out to see if hes serving the ewes, change the raddle colour after 14-16 days and see if ewes are being re-served. If there are a too many being missed or re-served, get another ram in there quick.

yessam

I would be very wary of injecting rams this time of year. Last year I had them in a garden close to the shed and turned them trough the foot bath every evening. It improved the rams feet and the ewes were serviced.

LostCovey

No injection affects a ram's fertility as much as a sore foot!

Injecting for a lameness you can't identify seems foolhardy, especially if you are talking about a ram in the first week of October.

Try to decide what's wrong with him before you decide what will cure it.

And above all beware of the mob of know-all hob lawyers, pub doctors, and scrub vets on here, including me.

Very quick to prescribe for your ram, but they bring their own to the vet.

LC

snowman707

LostCovey wrote: »

No injection affects a ram's fertility as much as a sore foot!
False depends why the foot is sore
Injecting for a lameness you can't identify seems foolhardy, especially if you are talking about a ram in the first week of October. true

Try to decide what's wrong with him before you decide what will cure it.
foot was warm but not foot rot would that not suggest anything to you?
And above all beware of the mob of know-all hob lawyers, pub doctors, and scrub vets on here, including me.
True
Very quick to prescribe for your ram, but they bring their own to the vet.

False
LC

As regards mobility ewes generally seek out the ram, and infertility causes are already stated

this scrub vet (or whatever category I fall into ) is off to bed

LostCovey

Originally Posted by LostCovey
No injection affects a ram's fertility as much as a sore foot!
False depends why the foot is sore
No it is not false - a sore foot is a sore foot. It doesn't matter in the least why it is sore. A lame ram won't perform as well as one that isn't lame


Injecting for a lameness you can't identify seems foolhardy, especially if you are talking about a ram in the first week of October.
true
But you recommended it anyway. For the crack I suppose.

Try to decide what's wrong with him before you decide what will cure it.
foot was warm but not foot rot would that not suggest anything to you?
Yes it would suggest something to me. Inflammation. Cause? Could be scald, sprain, fracture, abscess, foreign body. Could be anything. Probably scald, maybe not. But its not really a great time to be trying your theories out on someone else's sheep & ultimately their lamb crop

And above all beware of the mob of know-all hob lawyers, pub doctors, and scrub vets on here, including me.
True
Very quick to prescribe for your ram, but they bring their own to the vet

False
Sadly tis true. Anyone prescribing specific antibiotics for an animal they haven't seen is a genius, or.....a.......


LC
As regards mobility ewes generally seek out the ram, and infertility causes are already stated
This makes no sense, but whether they seek him out or not, anyone who thinks a lame ram will work as well as a sound one should ease up on the glib prescribing till they know a bit more about sheep breeding
this scrub vet (or whatever category I fall into ) is off to bed

snowman707 wrote: »

As regards mobility ewes generally seek out the ram, and infertility causes are already stated

this scrub vet (or whatever category I fall into ) is off to bed

This sort of nonsense was banned for a while, but the forum seems to have fallen off the wagon again.

Sure they're only animals, and it's only people's livelihoods. Arrah, sure what odds, take a guess and fire it out there, you know as much as the next man.

Nobody suggested yet that it could be rumen fluke or BVD or giving him a strong dose of bluestone or rubbing burnt oil on him.

Won't be long now

Lost Covey

Bleating Lamb

Examined foot well again,no sign of footrot,foreign body etc but he has been holding it up on and off for a few days,went to vet, he prescribed septoryll injection for 3 days ,it is not a sprain as foot not abnormally swollen....typical that they are fine all summer and go lame when needed...will raddle and watch him when the time comes...thanks for advice.I think it was Betamox I uses with previous ram .