3-30-12

The boys love to wear gloves:) Jacob trying to bottle feed one of the lambs born last night.

Jacob got hay in his eyes.

Jared and I did our usual ewe checks during the night. Around 5am I went out to check and noticed one of the ewes (#35) had a vaginal prolapse.  I called Jared to come out and we got her into a stall. Jared held her while I examined her. I could feel the lambs mouth but I couldn’t get through to the lamb. We put her on her back with her backside against my leg while I tried to find my way to the lamb. Then I realized that her cervix had not dialated. I remembered reading about this and its called ringwomb. It usually requires a c-section but you can sometimes stretch the cervic. I could only feel the nose/mouth so I knew its front feet were back making it an even more difficult delivery. We went inside and looked up numbers for calling large animal veterinarys near us. Then we decided to go out and first try to stretch the cervix. I felt so bad for the ewe. She was pushing so hard while I was trying to do this that she had an anal prolapse as well. I worked for awhile and got her cervix stretched to about my four fingers. We took a little break before continuing to stretch her cervix. I finally was able to get my hand in and got the head out far enough to get a snare cord behind the lambs ears. Then we put her with her back against my leg again because I had to push (against her contractions) the lamb out of the birth canal so I could bring the legs forward. After getting the first leg forward I put a snare cord on it. I got the second leg forward and put a snare cord on that too. Then I pulled all three cords until the lamb was out. He was a large lamb, weighing 10lbs 8oz. We cleared the mucous and once it was breathing well we put him by his mom’s head so she could lick him while we towel dried. We came out of the stall and another ewe was delivering. She delivered single 11 lb 2oz girl. This lamb was on its feet quickly and trying to nursing. We clipped/dipped the umbilical’s and stripped the mom’s teats. After a little while we came back out to make sure they were nursing. The 11 lb girl was doing very well. We went in to help the boy but he was weak. I gave him a tube feeding of colostrums. His mouth felt very cold so I took him temperature. The thermomitor wasn’t working thought. We brought him inside in front of the corn burner to warm him up. Jared went into town to get coffee’s from Tim Hortons, a new thermomitor from Meijer, and some antibiotics from tsc once they opened at 9:00. We gave the mom, who'd had the difficult labor, an injection of antibiotics. Jared cleaned up and soon was on his way to work. I took the lamb’s temperature and it was now 93.2 degrees (normal is 102-103). I added a warmed rice sock in under his towel. After breakfast the boys watched Curious George on Netflix. They loved petting the lamb through the cage. After tucking Eli in for a morning nap I went outside to check on the new mom’s. Ewe #35 was laying down and looked worn out. I gave her a drench of electrolytes because she wasn’t eating or drinking. I stood her up to check her rear end and noticed a couple hooves. I got some gloves/lube and reached in for the head. Pulling the head and legs I got the lamb out pretty quickly. After clearning its nose/mouth I put it by its mom. I went to grab some towels to dry it off and took care of her umbilical. This was a girl and weighed about 8lbs 12oz. I went inside to get some colostrums for a tube feeding. The boys were great at helping me with the tube feedings. They would push the syringe as I held the tube in place. Jacob tried bottle feeding the boys but he didn’t do to well at that. I checked the lambs temp every 30 minutes and once it was around the normal range and standing pretty well be took him back out to his mom. She is a very good mom and started licking him right away. The boys played in the barn while I cleaned it up and feed the animals. I noticed that Gladys was acting very doopy and had been standing in the same corner all morning with her head near the ground. She also wasn’t eating. I called Jared right away and he left work, went to tsc and picked up some Propylene glycol to treat Pregnancy toxemia. Jared then headed back to work. I tube fed the lambs from ewe #35. She did start nibbling on the hay and drank a little molasses water. When Jared got home from work we went out to the barn to clean it. The boys came out to play in the barn. We came back inside for a late dinner.