Minty and the bloat

Bloat is a terrible killer of bottle fed lambs. And before I go any further Minty did pull through so do not panic. You know if something does go seriously wrong like that I will tell you in plain language.  But I was horrified… …  when I came back from the Old Codgers, to find her in a corner of her pen, hunched up, and lethargic, with a terribly extended tummy. I could not see her shoulders or her hips.  She was round like a football. And hard as a rock. So I picked her up carefully and brought her inside. 

This was my fault because I had topped her up before I left for the retirement home.  Only half of what I usually feed her and two  hours after I had fed her the full feed, but it was enough to trigger bloat. A nasty build up of gases that is painful and often fatal.  It just shuts their systems down.  And it was three hours before I was back onboard. 

She could not pee though she tried and her breathing was raspy and wet. And she just lay like a rag.   I got an empty syringe and filled it with olive oil and slowly, little bits at a time I fed her about 5 mls of the oil.  (If you have mineral oil it is better, I don’t but I will get some on shopping day in case this happens again)  Then I made her a tiny potion of a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda with a little water and fed her that as well. Then I commenced the massaging of the tummy. She kept trying to go to sleep the poor wee thing and I kept making her walk round and round while I rubbed and lifted her belly.   She just stood with her head hung down, being pushed around the floor.  Nothing seemed to be making any difference for the longest time. After three hours of this she burped, then she peed a drop, and after a while she strained and peed a few more. I have never been so grateful to see an animal pee on my hard wood floor.  All this time the only fluids she had had were the oil,  and the soda water hours ago. Soon her belly made sloshy sounds as I rubbed and massaged. Over the next few hours she improved further, started to literally shrink  and began to clonk in her heels about the house, investigating and tasting everything  like a lanky teenager in tall heavy Doc Martin boots. So I gave her sips of warm water mixed with live yoghurt.

By 8pm, 7 and a 1/2 hours after I found her dying in a corner, she was pronounced good to go and after a series of tiny, tiny well spaced feeds of  diluted cow’s milk with a little yoghurt mixed in,  and no repercussions,  she was allowed back in with the others. I have had trouble with milk replacer before, so I had specially ordered this one and it was expensive and highly recommended. And now it is going to be expensive pig food. Minty and I are going to be using raw cows milk from now on.  The line between success and disaster is way too thin with processed milk replacer for this lamb.  Some of them seem prone to troubles. She needs the live enzymes to digest the milk. Cows milk has worked for me in the past.  I don’t know what I was thinking. Piggies on the run!  Good morning. Yes, the little pigs are here.  They spent all night sleeping in the deep hay in their pen, cuddled right up next to each other, like shiny cats.

All through the night I fed Minty  with the tiniest of feeds and the last two times (1am and 5am)  she bounced up out of her bed of straw and even called out her little lamb mew as she raced over for a little warm milk.   Every time she called she was answered by a sleepy piggie  grunt from the pen on the other side of the barn, then a low growl in the pig’s direction from TonTon.

You see, each time I go out to feed TonTon comes out with me and lays outside the lamb’s pen watching through the gate slats.   Well, you know that. But last night, laying in his usual spot, he had his head turned in the direction of the new pig pen with his tail facing the lambs gate. And the pigs are shufflers and grunters in the night so he had a lot to growl at from his self imposed guard box.

Well, let’s hope we have a calm day. I could do with a calm day with the minimum of fuss today.  Minty will be fed diluted milk twice as small and twice as often for a few days. I heard a saying from an old man once (I am paraphrasing) – ‘you cannot kill an infant  animal by underfeeding it but you sure can  kill it be over feeding it.’

I thought about how Mama feeds. The little ones get on the nipple and suck for only a few seconds then she moves and makes them reposition and suck again.  Then I thought about how I fed my own babies making them burp half way through before I carried on. So I am changing the way I feed Minty.  Now even though I feed her a small feed I will make her breathe and rest three or four times. And even when we go to full milk her feeds will stay small and frequent with rests.

We were lucky this time. I  had one bout of scours in a lamb last year and now bloat.  Neither of these are allowed to recurr.   I am lucky because this is my work. I do not have to rush somewhere else. So I am able to study the problem and try to match nature’s way as much as possible. And the old fashioned way is much slower.

In the old, old days a sick or orphaned lamb was brought into the kitchen and slept in a box by the wood stove, being fed frequently by the woman of the house, and the youngest children.  Always fresh cows milk. They were not so worried about keeping their kitchens  sanitised and uber shiny.  Nor did they have the time.  The people were more worried about getting food on the table, and food in the cellar for winter, and losing an animal was a significant threat to their own survival. Simple.

Lesson learned.

Good morning.  Cold again this morning! I better get out there and feed the piggies!!  Have a great day!

celi