I have a preemie that we found on March 13. She was doing fairly well on a bottle for about 3 days then decided to stop sucking and we have been feeding her on a tube. She needed to start on solid food so I put her in with another ewe and the ewe that was her mother ( took a while to determine) and she got depressed. I fed her with the tube but not as much, to get her to start eating solid food. I was concerned about dehydration since it was our first really hot days. She would only sit in the corner in the shade and bawl when we came in sight. She did eat some hay and started nosing at pellets. She constantly grits her teeth as if she is chewing a cud. After 3 days I gave up and brought her back in the house. She responded immediately. After about 12 hours she began to have listless periods. These lasted from 2 hours to 5 hours. I would feed her and she would perk up a bit and then just lay down and seem to sleep. She also would burp up large quantities of milk and some would squirt out her nose. I continued the bottle feeding. and gave a shot of penn for preventative pneumonia from possible aspiration of stomach contents. 2 days ago she seemed to be fine, then began to be constantly hungryand burping back stomach contents. We ground up some alfalfa leaves and oatmeal and mixed it with her milk replacer and got her to swallow it. I was feeding this mixture 3-4 oz every 2 hours. Yesterday about 1pm she began to be very unresponsive, then I took her outside and she bolted for the water tub and started drinking. I also gave her some water with a bottle and she sucked it. About 4pm the same thing. At 5pm it appeared that she was about to die. My vet was working and could not be contacted until he called about 7pm. I noticed ketosis and started looking on the web for causes of secondary ketosis. I came across a NZ web site that described enterotoxemia. I then found Jack Mauldin's web site about treating goats for enterotoxemia. By the time my vet called, I could describe the conditions and had started some antibiotics and banamine to ease the pain. My vet brought out some state of the art pharmaceuticals to give IV and we gave her about 500cc of IV fluids, dextrose, hetastarch, etc. Her blood pressure was so low that we had to put the IV in the neck to find a vein. At about 1am this morning she came around. We relieved the rumen pressure with a stomach tube and found blackish granules in a clear liquid indicating the stomach lining was eroded from the clostridium bacteria and confirmed our diagnosis... We put about 1 oz of kaopectate down the stomach tube and put her in her cage for the night.
This morning she is doing well, with a bad case of diarreah... This was caused by the fluctuation in diet from nearly starvation to well fed in a very short time. I think this happened earlier when we started giving her an additional syringe at feeding, and we thought it was something else, the clostridium was sort of maintained with the pennicillin, so we had a better chance of controlling the full blown toxemia. It appears this lamb never got colustrum to provide the antibodies for clostridium. (overeating disease vaccine). So, if you change the diets of our pets, you have to be careful what might happen.. Just thought I would share this as it has been a night I do not want to repeat. It has also been a learing experience I will not forget.. Cecil in OKla ----- Original Message ----- From: "Barb Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, April 22, 2006 12:13 AM Subject: Re: [blackbelly] Air blackbelly > > Thanks Dayna, > I actually found the dead lamb today. Apparently we hadn't looked as > thoroughly as we thought. It was a 2 pound 3 ounce preemie - I think > the ewe was too young when she was bred. At least I know what actually > happened now. Physically, she seems to be very happy to be shed of the > little intruder. I think the milk is already gone and she can go back > out with the flock in the morning. > > Thanks for your response - hope the redtails are happy just hunting > voles in my pasture! > > Barb > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Dayna Denmark" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: <[email protected]> > Sent: Friday, April 21, 2006 10:43 AM > Subject: Re: [blackbelly] Air blackbelly > > >> Barb, >> I know from first hand experience that a Redtail hawk is capable of >> snatching a newborn lamb.I have a very large resident female who made >> a pass >> at at a small lamb this year. Snagged her on the top of the neck but >> dropped >> her. The lamb is fine but I kept the next batch of babies confined >> till they >> were a little bigger. That big ol' hawk sat on the top of my shelter >> just >> waiting for her opportunity for an easy meal. This same hawk wiped out >> all >> my wild quail last yer- now if it would only get the pesky ground >> squirrels >> popping up everywhere! >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> This message is from the blackbelly mailing list >> Visit the list's homepage at %http://www.blackbellysheep.info >> >> > > > _______________________________________________ > This message is from the blackbelly mailing list > Visit the list's homepage at %http://www.blackbellysheep.info _______________________________________________ This message is from the blackbelly mailing list Visit the list's homepage at %http://www.blackbellysheep.info
