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Lambs with bottle jaw


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Two of our Tunis lambs (about 6 mos old) have developed bottle jaw. They have been treated for coccidia (treatment ended three weeks ago) and were wormed with Cydectin a week and a half ago. A fecal was done two days (I think) post worming and showed no to minimal parasite load. The bottle jaw showed up on Thursday for one lamb and yesterday for the other. They were on dry lot for about three weeks prior to being moved to pasture earlier this week. Their membranes are pink--not dark pink--basically the second level on the eye card. They move fine and aren't obviously weak. No scours. Ours is not a commercial flock.

 

I plan to wait to worm them again for at least another week based on advice I read from Mike Neary, and I understand that bottle jaw doesn't necessarily mean the wormer hasn't worked (also understand that the edema isn't directly caused by parasites). My question is what those who've dealt with bottle jaw successfully have done beyond worming. Based on advice from a local sheepman, I drenched them with a mix of nutridrench and cider vinegar (in recommended proportions) and gave a shot of pen g. His recommendation was IM iron once, B complex, A, D and Pen-G SQ every day for 7 days and a 1:1 cider vinegar/water drench twice over seven days,

 

My B complex was expired and I didn't have a and d, so I went with the nutridrench which has those. Since that also has iron, I didn't give a separate iron shot as I didn't want to overload in iron. I'm not actually sure about the need for antibiotics--I assume that recommendation came to prevent secondary infection since it's the wrong gram type for respiratory stuff like pneumonia (and the lambs show no sign of respiratory distress). I'm getting grain for them today to help build protein.

 

I'm newish to sheep and don't have all that many intuitions about treating them, so any advice greatly appreciated.

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I dealt with this for the first time last winter, there is a post about it that had good suggestions. My little guy was really weak so I through the pharmacy at him.

 

I really felt like the inj vit b and iron helped. He got nutridrench in between which after the first day or so he would suck on the syringe so I think his body needed it.

 

And I ended up adding some alfalfa to his hay too.

 

Best of luck.

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In my experience dealing with barberpole for many years, by the time they show true bottlejaw, they are in trouble. I would hit them with Ivermec or Cydectin.

Just my $.2,

A

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Hi Robin,

 

We're having an awful problem with parasites around here this summer. I agree with Anna in that by the time they show bottle jaw they are very sick and hard to bring back for long-term thriftiness. In this area the recommendation is to deworm with 2 different classes of dewormer on the same day: a "clear" one (ex. Cydectin) and a "white" one (ex. Valbazen). I have even hit mine with three different dewormers on the same day during the worst part of this summer. Yes, you should increase their protein consumption with grain or a protein block. Also should give a vitamin E/selenium injection. You can give Lixotinic as a supplement (off label for sheep). Be careful giving oral supplements with propylene glycol; a little is good, a lot shuts down the rumen; I wouldn't give more than 3 days in a row of it. Also, I wouldn't give the penicillin but would continue with the vitamin B injections.

 

When this happens in lambs it can mean that these individuals have a lower tolerance for parasites than their flock mates. Like you said, they have a low parasite load, but apparently they can't tolerate it. On the other hand, if these are your biggest, fattest lambs, they may be too busy putting their effort into growing instead of fighting off parasites. With intensive management you can get them to turn around, but in my experience, it hasn't been worth it. They don't do well in the long-term and don't work appropriately for dogs, often lagging behind when being worked or going into survival mode where they just give up and don't respond to the dog at all ("go ahead, kill me, I can't go on").

 

I think your area has liver flukes, is that right? If that's the case, be sure to deworm for that because damage to the liver could cause hypoproteinemia which could cause bottle jaw.

 

Oh, one other thing I've done that helps better than anything previously mentioned is a blood transfusion. That would be if they get really depressed and you're set on doing everything possible to save them. It's easy for me to do on my own sheep, but I don't know what your vet would charge for it. On the plus side, it's super easy to do in sheep!

 

Good luck!

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Thanks for the advice all, esp, the detail Emily (not sure a blood transfusion will be feasible--they aren't noticeably altered other than the fluid). We did also worm them with a white wormer on Wed (Synanthic). They are off pasture again, so we'll see how they fare with some additional care. Haven't heard much about liver flukes here but I'll check with our farm vet.

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