[Jacob-list] Wobbly lambs and Se

[Neal Grose]

a neighbor of mine had sheep and carefully fed copper free supplements until she found out that her sheep had copper deficiency anemia. Our thinking is that our VERY high iron soils prevented uptake of copper. 

it is worth noting that mineral content that can result in copper deficiency in Jacob sheep can produce copper toxicity in white face longwools. We have had that as well. the results are about like setting off a metabolic hand grenade in your animals.

Neal Grose 
North Carolina

From: stockdogs 
Sent: Friday, March 25, 2011 1:44 PM
To: jacob-list at jacobsheep.com 
Subject: Re: [Jacob-list] Wobbly lambs and Se

Hi All,



I've lurked for quite awhile and always read the Jacob list with great interest as there is so much knowledge collected here.  I notice the talk of copper deficiency and wanted to pass along that this has been cropping up with Shetland breeders for the past couple of years.  I had four sheep serum tested last year and all were copper, zinc and magnesium deficient.  Selenium was fine.   I had soil test done and my property is low in molybdenum and high in zinc, I always keep loose sheep/goat minerals on hand so why they are deficient is the mystery.  None of us can figure out what is inhibiting the uptake of copper.  I've recently tried copper oxide boluses from NZ and a friend used copper/cobalt/selenium boluses she got from the UK.  It will take some time to figure out if these help since it's a time release process. 



I'd be interested to hear about the mixture Heather came up with that includes Red Cell.  Can you share?



Thank you,

Sally

Granite Falls, WA







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Message: 1
Date: Wed, 23 Mar 2011 13:45:19 -0600
From: "gotothewhip at aol.com"gotothewhip at aol.com

We treated with multiple doses of BoSe with no results. We also tested on  
necropsy and the only thing he was deficient in was COPPER.  

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Message: 3
Date: Wed, 23 Mar 2011 16:23:03 -0400
From: "Heather Hettick" hettick.1 at osu.edu


That makes some sense.  The Icelandic people are finding a lot of sheep who are deficient in copper or other minerals and the mixture I make contains Red Cell, which has copper.  My last two lambs with the wobbles have received this so maybe that is part of what has helped them too.  I need to get some livers tested to see how my sheep are actually doing with minerals, but I haven?t done it yet.  I do more experimenting and really should get the tests to have a better idea that what I?m doing is the right thing.  

Heather





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