sheep

for any sheep farmers out there, yesterday I had 2 lambs about 50 lbs and 3 months old and twins one male 1 female go down, at 4 PM they were fine, by 7 PM they were down and thrashing, the first one has it's head pulled back over it's back as far as possible. no signs of injury or unusual discharge in either. anyone have anything this happen or venture a guess the male died this morning

White Muscle Disease is the first thing that comes to mind. Are you in a Selenium deficient area? Do the ewes and lambs get a sheep mineral feed with Selenium added? WMD will give those symptoms among others. Doesn't sound like respiratory or worms. Not Coccidia either, unless they had a runny stool. Were either running a temp? Tetanus is another possibility on;y you won't get much thrashing. Were they at all lethargic prior to this? Poisoning is another possibility. Were they eating anything new or unusual? Maybe bought in bales or hay off a new field or one they hadn't eaten off before? An autopsy is the surest way to find out what killed them, WMD kills very fast once it reaches critical level. You can find pictures on many places. If you even think it might be WMD a shot of BoSe (Vit B and Selenium) will often save them if they aren't too far gone. If it is WMD then you need to either get some dedicated sheep mineral (no copper) down in front of your sheep or hit the whole flock with BoSe.

I don't know if you have any sheep oriented vets in your area or if you flock size justifies using one. If it doesn't or you don't have any sheep vets in your area, I highly recommend this book- http://sheepbooks.com/LP.html It's a lamb specific diagnostic workbook that outlines issues through flow charts, descriptions and remedies. It also outlines all the various diseases, illness, etc of course. No shepherd should be without it in my opinion.

We home school so I'll be on the computer off and on all day. I'll try to check back.

if I remember correctly pulling the head back like that is a sign of severe pain.

Sounds like grass tetany in cattle. Look up grass tetany in sheep for more info.

vet also says probably vitamin deficiency, the hay they're eating has been in feeder for 3 weeks, just really strange it was a set of twins. will try the vitamin route, maybe save the others....don't think grass tet. grass isn't growing yet....have 3 inches on snow on it right now...the pics are at 2 months old...they appear super healthy,..and before anyone gives me h'll for letting them in the feeder, it was an escape that day only
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If your vet has BoSe or something like it it doesn't take a lot to save them. It's Sub-Q injection, about 2cc for lambs your size, check the package instructions. Or you can get sheep mineral for the ones that aren't showing any problems. Go with a loose mineral, not blocks. Sheep can't gnaw off the blocks very well like a horse or goat or have enough tongue like a cow to get enough.

If you cut open the dead lamb and look at the heart and it's streaked with white tissue, that's WMD. I;m not sure of the exact mechanism, but it always looked to me like the muscle atrophied and died.

Check the mothers milk. It may have blood in it. If she got mastitis the infection can kill them. I had hair sheep for 2 years,lost 13 lambs in 3 days after a good snow dump in April. Mothers all went sour from the storm,or so the vet said. I din't buy it but sold them all anyway and went to wool breeds.

Grandpa used to say that sheep were the only animals God put on earth that spent their whole life looking for a place to die!
And, a sick sheep is a dead sheep. True Son

How is your vaccination program?

http://www.sheep101.info/201/vaccinations.html

Enterotoxemia type D is "classic" overeating disease. That will take your biggest best doing lambs just as you discribed. I vac ewes 1 month pre-lambing, vac lambs at 4 wks, and again at 8 wks. That is what has worked for me. The past 2 yrs now and no issues. 60 lambs under 2 mo right now... 190 % lamb rate with only 5% death loss.

Are those Dorper?

(quoted from post at 10:29:07 03/24/15) Check the mothers milk. It may have blood in it. If she got mastitis the infection can kill them. I had hair sheep for 2 years,lost 13 lambs in 3 days after a good snow dump in April. Mothers all went sour from the storm,or so the vet said. I din't buy it but sold them all anyway and went to wool breeds.

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Yeah, I'd like to hear the vets thought train on that too.

A vitamin deficiency isn't going to kill them overnight. The way I read your post it sounds as if it was very sudden, also not a symptom of White muscle disease. Classic symptoms of tetanus are stiff legs, locked jaws and head stretched over its back. My two suggestions are to immediately vaccinate everything for overeating and tetanus, costs 50 cents a head and prevention is the best medicine. Bottle will say Clostridium Perferinges Types C&D and Tetanus. Best of luck to you and your lambs.

Nate

(reply to post at 12:32:19 03/24/
15)

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WMD will appear as a very sudden event in young lambs if you aren't noticing the lethargy they develop over a few days before they suddenly drop. One of the problems with sheep is they are stoic and often don't appear ill until they are at deaths door.

In my area there are NO large animal vets who know
much about sheep. Just horses and dairy cows.
Guys with sheep are few an far between so we are
pretty much on our own.

Are Dorpers more prone to enterotoxemia than
others?

Nate........Norm Gates of U Washington A&M (Spokane) sez vaccinate with Clostridium Perferinges C&D and Tetanus. Commonly known as 8-WAY. NEVER muscle inject ALWAYS "sub-cut". (sub-cutaneous) Just pick-up the skin of the neck and shoulders and inject into the "space". The reason you don't muscle inject is it causes "knots" that are in-editable. There is 'nuttin' more delicious than roast leg of lamb; altho some claim lamb-chops are more delicious. Caution: there is a difference between sweet LAMB and stinky mutton. Sheep are the only livestock that gives you 2-crops. Edible lamb and fireproof wool. Unlike cotton and nylon, wool does NOT BURN or MELT, it just scorches. It is the choice of tankers and battleship gunners. ........sheepy Dell

Dorper are not more susceptible that I know of. I only asked because the terminal Sire I use is half Dorper/half Colombian. Some of my lambs look similar to his pictures.

thanks everyone,..they are dorper katahdin cross,2 are dorper and wool cross..i was lax in my vaccinations this year,..i'm gonna have the vet check the milk as it's so strange to have twins die that close together..sounds like something in the milk to me, will let you know if I find anything

Sounds like Entero, Polio, or even Listeriosis. Is your hay clean? Mold can cause all sorts of issues.

Greg

It'll take 5 minutes to cut one open and see if it's WMD. If it's not evident, go from there.