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Thursday, December 19, 2013

Entropion/turn-in eyelid in lambs

When I was reading in Raising Sheep The Modern Way last night I came across the problem with the lambs eyes. It's caused by their eyelids being curled inwards causing their lashes and hair to rub the eyeball. In her   case its her bottom lids. Natasha Marie recognized this just from the picture I posted.



I have to say the forms of treatment did not sound very good. Stitching the eyelid to the cheek to hold it down, cutting the eyelid to make it open properly, holding the lids open with tape (I don't know how that works) and there was something in the book about injecting medication under the lid to form a bubble to hold it open till it heals. But I didn't quite understand it. I was tired, and it was late. So I put the book down. So this morning I did a google search, and this video is the first thing to pop up.

                        

After my Mom and I watched it a couple of times, we decided to give it a try. I held, while my Mom injected. We already had the necessities. The first eye went pretty smoothly except for having to make a needle change after the first one clogged, and then blew off spraying penicillin everywhere. So we got it full of 1 ml. and it looked great. Then for the second eye. For some reason she could only get a tiny bit of penicillin in it. At first she thought the needle was clogged, but it wasn't. She eventually tried a larger needle, and it still wouldn't fill the lid. For some reason she just flat out could not get it to fill the lid, like there was no where for it to go. But she got a little in it, and it was staying open properly. So we decided that between the little bit we got in her and the number of times she got jabbed would hopefully keep it swollen long enough for the eye to heal, and she got penicillin in all those jabs. Hopefully all will be well, and she took it like a champ. Oh ya, we also put more mastitis medication in her eyes. This stuff comes sterilized in a syringe , and is the same ointment they sell for eye infections, but much cheaper.

Then it was time to dock both girls tails. We already knew to band them with the elastrator, we just didn't know exactly the right spot. When the video for the eye problem finished it popped up with their other video for tail docking. I love the internet! I can't get it to embed the docking video, but here is the link http://youtu.be/ny06ppuH3Oo

And we finally settled on names. Myrtle, and Magnolia (Maggie for short).

Kimberly

6 comments:

Farm Girl Hannah said...

I'm so glad you got her all fixed up!!! They are so cute! This makes me want to have sheep even more.

~Hannah

Tasha said...

I'm glad you got it all figured out! Nice when you can fix the problem yourself. :)

I have had to deal with entropion on several occasions, so I recognized the symptoms in that picture. :) Once, I had a lamb with both his lower and upper eyelids on both eyes rolled under. Yikes! No matter what I did, they wouldn't stay uncurled, so I had to have the vet come suture them. Not brave enough to do that on my own, I'm afraid. ;) It's a hereditary issue, so I sold the ewe whos lambs kept doing that and haven't had a problem since, thank goodness!

I was going to mention docking their tails, but you've already got that sorted. ;)

I LOVE those names! Hey, I have a Maggie, too! Only it's short for Margaret. :)

Harry Flashman said...

You are extremely proficient in doing your own vet work. I try to do that with my ferrets. They only go to the vet when I am at my wits end. I hope things work out well with the two lambs.

Kris said...

Kimberly, the lambs are adorable. I can't wait for all my ewes to lamb. But I do hope they wait til at least March. I sure hope that eye heals and she'll be ok.

Harry Flashman said...

Kimberly,

Best Wishes for a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

An At Home Daughter said...

Thanks Harry.
You too.

Kimberly