Lambing 2017

davidk1394 · 16-03-2017 10:28PM

Green farmer wrote: »

Lads was someone asking as to why ewes reject one of their lambs ? Had 3 seperate instances of it here in the last week . At first I thought maybe the lamb was weak or something, but then I saw a trend, all ewes doing it were Charley x ewes from a ram I had a few years ago. All about 4 yr old sheep. Another reason why not to seek Charley x genes as breeders.

Mainly Charollais here. Saw 1 occasion of it here 2 weeks ago. Put the ewe into an adoption crate and after 2 days was fine. Was there another ewe trying to take them or licking them ?

Green farmer · 16-03-2017 10:43PM

davidk1394 wrote: »

Mainly Charollais here. Saw 1 occasion of it here 2 weeks ago. Put the ewe into an adoption crate and after 2 days was fine. Was there another ewe trying to take them or licking them ?

Maybe , only arrived shortly after lambing, but the Charley x only made up about 5-10% of the flock, but the 3 instances of it here in the last week or so are all Charley x

Green farmer · 16-03-2017 11:05PM

Two pens down , I have this mountainy ewe after lambing twins in the last few minutes. I reached down into the pen to put iodine on the navel, she went straight for my arm with a headbutt, gave my a laugh, some mothering genes in her.

Update on Charley ewe........,,

Left her out of the headlock late last night. Was afraid that if a fox went into the sheds the lambs would be unguarded. Found the second lamb dead. She must have kept battering it. Found my on notes from last year and found she had poor mothering ability and initially didn't want her lamb, had her marked for a possible cull but never followed through after weaning. Fuming, was a lovely quality lamb and all.

arctictree · 23-03-2017 03:13PM

Well last one just lambed today. Do ye lads include the empties when working out your lambing %? Without the two empties, we have 1.84 lambs out in the field. 1.7 including the empties.

getoverit11 · 23-03-2017 03:26PM

Can lambs be tagged at a few days old?

roosky · 24-03-2017 03:00PM

getoverit11 wrote: »

Can lambs be tagged at a few days old?

Ya, just make sure to avoid the veins in the ear

roosky · 24-03-2017 03:02PM

I have about 50 ewes lambed and I have 3 already that have one blind side.

They are solid as a rock with a tiny amount of milk as in a drop!,

All ewes were checked before going to the ram and these three were first time lambers so couldnt have had mastitis last year,

Any ideas what it might be?

TIA

Bleating Lamb · 25-03-2017 08:37AM

Just had a funny one dealing with a wild mountain cross ewe after lambing twins,in middle of 3 acre field,a real little and large set,big lamb up and had sucked and small lamb cold and weak from frost and no suck,went back to get trailer for quad.Park it up beside lambs in field and ewe starts running in circles 10 meters away...I'm thinking this lady might not co operate!...put the two lambs up on trailer with active lamb further in,ewe is good mother so goes over to door,sniffs it and jumps in....then if you could read sheeps facial expressions she thinks 'O my God what have I done!' turns and makes for back out!...I barely grab her by back leg mid jump,hang on and get her back on trailer...lambs under lamp now after a feed of biestings.

davidk1394 · 25-03-2017 09:11AM

Have about 85 left here plus the ewe lambs. Happy with the lambing so far. Standing at around 4% mortality

charolais0153 · 25-03-2017 09:42AM

davidk1394 wrote: »

Have about 85 left here plus the ewe lambs. Happy with the lambing so far. Standing at around 4% mortality

Is mortality dead lambs over total lambs... Is that including all deaths or just preventable ones

ganmo · 25-03-2017 11:33AM

Bleating Lamb wrote: »

Just had a funny one dealing with a wild mountain cross ewe after lambing twins,in middle of 3 acre field,a real little and large set,big lamb up and had sucked and small lamb cold and weak from frost and no suck,went back to get trailer for quad.Park it up beside lambs in field and ewe starts running in circles 10 meters away...I'm thinking this lady might not co operate!...put the two lambs up on trailer with active lamb further in,ewe is good mother so goes over to door,sniffs it and jumps in....then if you could read sheeps facial expressions she thinks 'O my God what have I done!' turns and makes for back out!...I barely grab her by back leg mid jump,hang on and get her back on trailer...lambs under lamp now after a feed of biestings.

i was moving a very stampy ewe yesterday, she wouldn't take her eyes off me or take a backwards step, the lambs wander off and once they make a noise shes gone

rangler1 · 25-03-2017 11:43AM

charolais0153 wrote: »

Is mortality dead lambs over total lambs... Is that including all deaths or just preventable ones

Usually everything from scanning to weaning or at least letting out in the field

charolais0153 · 25-03-2017 04:37PM

rangler1 wrote: »

Usually everything from scanning to weaning or at least letting out in the field

It would be 6% without but with abortion its about fifteen...not good ,will vacinnate next year

FarmerDougal · 25-03-2017 07:27PM

No empties
82% lambed
2.0 lambs on the ground
1 dead sheep
No adoptions
Small flock

rangler1 · 25-03-2017 07:34PM

charolais0153 wrote: »

It would be 6% without but with abortion its about fifteen...not good ,will vacinnate next year

6% would be good from scanning to let out, you can aim for that for next year.
We only lost two in the first 300 lambs, but have 26 dead in 556 at the moment, a good few lambed premature in the second bunch and it was paddys weekend and no labs open when they started to die.
What caused the abortion with you

davidk1394 · 25-03-2017 07:48PM

rangler1 wrote: »

6% would be good from scanning to let out, you can aim for that for next year.
We only lost two in the first 300 lambs, but have 26 dead in 556 at the moment, a good few lambed premature in the second bunch and it was paddys weekend and no labs open when they started to die.
What caused the abortion with you

We had a lot of premature lambs aswell and 1 with schmallenburg. Only lost 3 due to our own stupidity

charolais0153 · 25-03-2017 08:01PM

rangler1 wrote: »

6% would be good from scanning to let out, you can aim for that for next year.
We only lost two in the first 300 lambs, but have 26 dead in 556 at the moment, a good few lambed premature in the second bunch and it was paddys weekend and no labs open when they started to die.
What caused the abortion with you

Vet said it was more than likely toxo. Auld lad wouldn't bring the foetus or cleaning to a lab so we will blood test the ones that aborted. We still have a decent amount of lambs on the ground 1.7 I think...the same as last year. One that died a week ago would really boil the piss tho, a good strong lamb 22kgs was kicking and I brought him up to shed ,met the vet with him and he gave him injection but he was dead that evening

Green farmer · 25-03-2017 11:05PM

Running about 15 % here. Arrived in shed one morning a week or two ago to find 5 out of 6 lambs born overnight dead. Abortion ruled out, so just stupidity of ewes, bad weather took 3 in a field, odd lamb born weak, the list goes on. No real fault of my own, as I'm doing everything I can. Just need to cull heavy for lack of maternal genes. In reality if the sheep does its job right , then you've an easy job, sheep doesn't do its part, then your picking up all the extra slack.

charolais0153 · 26-03-2017 07:34AM

Green farmer wrote: »

Running about 15 % here. Arrived in shed one morning a week or two ago to find 5 out of 6 lambs born overnight dead. Abortion ruled out, so just stupidity of ewes, bad weather took 3 in a field, odd lamb born weak, the list goes on. No real fault of my own, as I'm doing everything I can. Just need to cull heavy for lack of maternal genes. In reality if the sheep does its job right , then you've an easy job, sheep doesn't do its part, then your picking up all the extra slack.

Had two my own fault,one with a scum in middle of day and another that was out in too big a group during bad weather

Green farmer · 26-03-2017 09:23PM

2/3 of flock lambed and back in field at this stage. Going to close up sheds next weekend. Amazing how quiet the shed gets and how faster you can do your rounds when you get down to this percentage left to lamb. First night I've really noticed it.

kk.man · 27-03-2017 08:27AM

Green farmer wrote: »

2/3 of flock lambed and back in field at this stage. Going to close up sheds next weekend. Amazing how quiet the shed gets and how faster you can do your rounds when you get down to this percentage left to lamb. First night I've really noticed it.

+1

Bleating Lamb · 31-03-2017 03:35PM

Lambing outside,went through all bunches in fields today to put the remaining ewes to lamb together for ease of looking at them.15 ewes still to lamb,about 3 won't lamb for a few weeks but all others close to it.Happy enough with compactness of lambing as first ewe lambed on March 10th.

Can be hard to judge ewes as when I handled them pre lambing I was fearful that lambing would be far more spread out this year.

MeTheMan · 31-03-2017 08:49PM

Bleating Lamb wrote: »

Lambing outside,went through all bunches in fields today to put the remaining ewes to lamb together for ease of looking at them.15 ewes still to lamb,about 3 won't lamb for a few weeks but all others close to it.Happy enough with compactness of lambing as first ewe lambed on March 10th.

Can be hard to judge ewes as when I handled them pre lambing I was fearful that lambing would be far more spread out this year.

How many do you lamb in total? I've 80 started 26 Feb and still 5 in the shed. Only one ewe has lambed in the last week. Some first timers so they probably weren't standing to still for the ram.

Bleating Lamb · 01-04-2017 05:38AM

Put 110 to the ram,106 scanned in lamb.

Oldira · 01-04-2017 07:58AM

I have two sets of triplets out in a paddock with the ewes. Two weeks old and all lambs are thriving. Last night and today though both ewes are not eating their nuts. Normally the would break through a wall for i. I did change the brand of nuts yesterday. It could hardly be that? Sheep are hardly that fussy?

Lambman · 01-04-2017 08:06AM

Oldira wrote: »

I have two sets of triplets out in a paddock with the ewes. Two weeks old and all lambs are thriving. Last night and today though both ewes are not eating their nuts. Normally the would break through a wall for i. I did change the brand of nuts yesterday. It could hardly be that? Sheep are hardly that fussy?

They'll know surely but should take too them after a few days? For wat reason did you change at this stage?

Oldira · 01-04-2017 10:04AM

No reason other than the co-op I was in on Thursday didn't have any of my normal bags!

Cran · 01-04-2017 10:53AM

Oldira wrote: »

I have two sets of triplets out in a paddock with the ewes. Two weeks old and all lambs are thriving. Last night and today though both ewes are not eating their nuts. Normally the would break through a wall for i. I did change the brand of nuts yesterday. It could hardly be that? Sheep are hardly that fussy?

Check for mastitis ewes feeding 3 more prone & unlikely just don't like the new feed

DJ98 · 01-04-2017 02:40PM

Have a lamb that was born paddy's day that has gotten very weak, cold and miserable, not drinking, under a heat lamp now but wont take a bottle, finding it difficult to stand now, any ideas of what can be done!

White Clover · 01-04-2017 04:39PM

DJ98 wrote: »

Have a lamb that was born paddy's day that has gotten very weak, cold and miserable, not drinking, under a heat lamp now but wont take a bottle, finding it difficult to stand now, any ideas of what can be done!

Have you taken its temperature?
Have you tubed any electrolyte or milk into it to keep energy level up and prevent dehydration.
Take to vet?

Lambing 2017

Comments