[Jacob-list] bloat lamb ram

[Karen Sigler]

  Hello- just wanted to share an interesting experience we had 
yesterday.... Monday I had an ewe have twin lambs, ram and ewe.  Big 
beautiful lambs.  We had to help a little to get them out,  but 
everything went well with mom and babes.  Yesterday morning when I went 
out to check and feed everyone the ram lamb was bloating???  I had goats 
who bloated a few years ago and I still  had bloat drench on hand. Gave 
some he was still bloating....and this is on mom's milk.  Starting 
calling the two local vets. One was not in and the other was in surgery 
for the next couple of hours.  My ram lamb was not going to make it by 
then,  so I called a friend who is really good at raising "sheep-sheep" 
and thinks I have the strange ones (which so far I can understand, 
because she is the one who helped me with the prolapse uterus of my 
shetland ewe).  I explained he was bloating, but I had no idea why.... 
Once she got here she asked have you seen him poop?? We looked under the 
tail... no poop hole.  Figuring we had nothing to lose at this point, I 
went into the house for a knife and razor blade.  She sat down on the 
chair,  the rams front feet on the ground, his body between her legs and 
his butt in her lap and started to make an incision.....We got an 
immediate spray, shot about two feet in the air.  My friend said she had 
thought about changing her clothes before she came over, but was glad 
she had not she was a mess.  We just gently squeezed his sides and 
continued the flow.  Later my husband came home and took him to the 
vet.  and asked he he was going to live and the vet. said  "I have not a 
clue.  I have never had someone make a butt hole and then ask me this 
question before."  Today he is still with us and doing much better as 
amazing as it is to us.  I will be wethering him next week, once we get 
past the stress and trauma of this week.
Karen Sigler
Benjamin Farms  Utah