Thursday, April 30, 2009
Not a good ending to the day ....
Well, I told you so......it's a matter of time when something goes terribly wrong, and I was due. It did tonight. I've been watching Windsprite for a while, her tail at half mast, about ready to lamb. I went into the pen early this evening to talk to her, she didn't look very bright.......a little dull. I went to the barn and got the MFO solution and gave her 20cc. I left for an hour and 15 minutes, to let her rest and see if that perked her up. I was too late.....I found her dead. Yes, in just an hour and 15 minutes she'd gone from walking around, this afternoon she was eating grain and hay with the others. So quick. I hurried and went in, pulled out 2 lambs, both beautiful HST's, a boy and a girl, teeth were white and emerged, both appropriate sized, not big, not small. Both were already gone. I tried to resuscitate, I did noses, pumped chests, tried for gag reflexes. Nothing. Just too dang late. We do try to save them all, we watch them closely, we notice little things. It does happen, we loose one. But we are never ever happy with ourselves because we could have done more, we're sure we could have, if we'd only caught that subtle sign that something was just not right. I'm sorry Windsprite, you were a wonderful girl and I wish you'd stayed years longer with us, rest well in green pastures now.
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10 comments:
What a horrible thing to happen. I'm sor sorry to hear of your loss. Do you know what it was? Some sort of vitamin deficiency? It easy to beat ourselves up when these things happen but all we can do is learn from the experience and move on. Hope you have a better day today.
So sorry! What a sad thing to go through. It's good that you went right in to salvage the lambs, sorry it was too late.
Sorry to hear that this happened. Any ideas what could have caused her death?
It doesn't sound like ketosis if she was was eating that afternoon.
Oh No! Not Windsprite! I am so sorry, after all you went through to bring her to you.
I believe it was Hypocalcaemia. Windsprite was 7 years old and this was her first year here as Kara knows, she flew up with Garrett's Peyton last year. She was always first to the grain morning and night. Yesterday morning she made her normal gallop as soon as she saw me coming, so it was a fairly rapid decline. A necropsy is being done today although I suspect nothing odd will be found. Her loss is very sad.
wow Szzzzzz....after all that work to get her there....and then to lose her so suddenly...wow. i've never heard of what you think she may have died from...and i can't imagine....
what a pity they were both HSTs and not able to saved. try and concentrate on the trial this weekend....chin up! just remember all your EWE lambs!!
Garrett - hypocalcaemia is 'milk fever', imbalance of calcium to phosphorous (2:1). She was pulling too much calcium from her bones for the lambs and couldn't make up for it. Since no one else this year showed any problems at all, I'm suspicious. But if she's had mild hypo for a few days, then she could/would crash which is what it appears happened. Her udder was average size, not overly capacious. I had an older ewe do this about 8 years ago and I was able to save her, she responded quickly to the MFO. I've had several heavy milk producers in my dairy goats over the years do it right before birthing and saved them too. The only other thing I can think of is if both lambs were heading out at the same time and she kept holding off, trying to help rearrange them, wearing herself down as well as the hypo coming on. Perhaps the necropsy will show something, a simple tear in the uterus can bring on a slow death too. Poor girl. :-(
I'm so sorry, Suzanne! Even with the gorgeous ewe lambs you have this year, it is a bitter pill to lose a ewe and two beautiful spotted lambs. Like you said, we want and try to save them ALL. Sigh.
So sorry, Suzanne, for your loss.
I am so very sorry to read about Windsprite, Suzanne. And I know losing the lambs must've been especially hard as well.
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