If you pinch a lamb's skin over the spine it should snap back almost immediately. But if the skin stays in place like a tent, the lamb is dehydrated and needs immediate attention,” she says. She adds that you can also take a lamb's rectal temperature to confirm hypothermia. “Normal lamb body temperature is 39°C.
With one motion, pinch and pull the lamb's skin by the neck and see if the skin easily returns to the animal's body. If the skin takes a while after being “tented”, the lamb is likely dehydrated and needs fluids quickly.
When animals are dehydrated they may have reduced appetite and discoloured urine. A well hydrated animal has clear urine. Colour changes from yellow to orange to brown occur as dehydration progresses from mild to moderate to severe.
You may need to drench affected ewes with up to 1L of water to help overcome dehydration. Make sure that there is accessible water and shade for them. You also need to provide adequate soft feed such as grain or lucerne hay which is necessary to keep the digestive system working and provide enough energy.
If the skin stays momentarily tented or peaked, the lamb is dehydrated. Immediately tube the lamb with milk and consult your veterinarian for proper treatment.
Visual Dehydration Symptoms
There are both physical signs and behavioral signs that can indicate if an animal is dehydrated. Common signs include lethargy, tightening of the skin, weight loss and drying of mucous membranes and eyes.
Dehydration can also be caused by poor water quality, or animals not being trained on a new water source. In the late part of the summer, water sources prone to runoff can become contaminated with blue-green algae. The algae impacts the taste of the water and animals will be less willing to drink.
LAMBS, GOAT KIDS, FAWNS OR CRIAS
Mix 1 enclosed scoop (1 oz) of electrolytes powder into 1 pint (16 fluid oz) of warm water. Offer 4 fluid oz (1/2 cup) of electrolytes solution for each 6 pounds of body weight, 2 to 3 times daily.
If sheep are consuming wet grass or feeds like silage they won't drink as much water as their is water content in their food. If however, they are being fed dry hay or dry grass their requirement for water will increase.
Water intake is positively correlated to feed intake. Water can be free flowing or provided in buckets, troughs, tubs, stock tanks or automatic waterers. It goes without saying that water sources should be kept clean and free from hay, straw, and fecal matter. Smaller troughs are easier to drain and clean.
(Ammonia Toxicosis, Urea Poisoning)
It is acute and often rapidly fatal, with clinical signs including muscle tremors, abdominal pain, incoordination, respiratory distress, and recumbency, then death.
Water: provide access to fresh, clean water from day one, and at a height which is easily accessible to lambs at all times. Creep feed: top quality creep feed should be introduced from one week of age, and offered fresh at least once a day. Refusals can be fed to the ewes.
Sheep and goats need to have access to enough fresh, clean water at all times. If that's impossible, you should provide water at least twice a day.
Domesticated animals can live about 60 days without food but only about 7 days without water. Livestock should be given all the water they can drink because animals that do not drink enough water may suffer stress or dehydration.
Sheep water requirements: Between 4-14 litres per head per day. Stock water requirements litres/animal/day.
quality of ration, and overall health condition. General rule of thumb: 1 oz daily per 250# body weight. Sheep 1/2-1 oz/day, Offer free-choice 50:50 mix with water.
Sheep need salt. However, offering salt as the only mineral available to your flock won't meet all their needs. It's not uncommon in some pastures to see sheep only receiving a salt block. That won't get the job done when you want to push for higher weaning rates and breeding percentages.
White salt or “sheep salt” block should be available at all times. Red salt blocks or salt blocks formulated for cattle and/ or horses should be avoided because they contain excess copper. Loose salt is recom- mended for lambs.
PRIOR TO WARMING, lambs more than five hours old with severe hypothermia (< 37°C, 98°F) should be given an intraperitoneal injection of a warm 20 percent dextrose (glucose) solution at a dose of four to five milliliters per pound of body weight.
Your vet may advise you to begin offering your dog small amounts of water to begin the rehydration process while you are on your way to their office. Treatment for dogs suffering from this level of dehydration is re-hydration using intravenous fluids.
"But overfeeding is the biggest issue once a lamb is on milk replacer, and it too can produce scours." This is because milk should be processed in the sheep's fourth stomach, and overfeeding can spill milk into the rumen, where it ferments, so the lamb gets gassy and the stomach becomes extended.
Several other factors can affect water consumption. Temperature is probably the most obvious. Sheep normally consume more water when temperatures rise above 70 degrees F. Increased water intake allows sheep to account for higher levels of water loss due to increased respiration, or rapid breathing, on hot days.