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Pre-Breeding Routine

	Member	Message
	Biddy14inNE	Posted 06/18/12 11:22AM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		Haven't been on here in a while...I almost forgot how to post!! Just out of curiosity...what do you do as your pre-breeding routine? Worming? CD-T? Fly guard type stuff? All I did last year (first year with a "real" flock) was flush them out for two week prior to turning out the rams. It worked well, and I had about a 95% breed-up. The few that didn't breed were all over eight years old, so that's not a problem. However, I had six young, healthy, well-fed ewes slough their lambs in the second trimester. I'm looking into abortion vaccines, but would that be before turning the rams out or during gestation? Thanks, Biddy14
	EmsoffLambs	Posted 06/18/12 12:48PM  Changed 06/18/12 12:50PM
		Good idea to start your preventative program now, especially since you had problems last year. Having dealt with abortions myself the past few years, I know how devastating it can be. First, did you have a necropsy done on the aborted lambs? There are many different infectious diseases that cause abortion in sheep and it is imperative to identify the causative agent for both treatment and prevention. Different diseases require different prevention protocols and different treatments. Based on your question, I am assuming you do NOT know what caused the abortions, which will make prevention more challenging. First, you should vaccinate for chlamydia and vibrio (campylobactor). I would recommend using Pipestone's Camplylobactor fetus/jejuni vaccine as most will only cover the fetus strain and not the jejuni. I had jejuni abortions two years ago, so it's important to vaccinate for both. Some also recommend vaccinating for lepto, especially if your sheep are around cattle. Follow the labels carefully. A couple of the vaccines need to be given before breeding with a booster after breeding. The others are given after breeding with a booster in mid-late gestation. Buy your vaccines early as the supplies often run out. Next, during the middle and last trimesters, feeding aureomycin will help prevent chlamydia abortions and deccox or rumensin will help prevent toxoplasmosis abortion. Finally, abortions are often worse the second year than they were the first as more ewes have now been exposed. If any ewe aborts again, immediately get the fetus and placenta to a lab for diagnostics. They will also be able to tell you which drugs will work to stop the abortion storm.
	hmm	Posted 06/18/12 01:56PM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		sounds like vibro to me... abort about a month before due-- mostly in first time lambers...
	HansenLivestock	Posted 06/18/12 03:20PM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		Would you guys reccomend vaccinating all ewes and ewe lambs, regardless if they have shown any signs abortion? What protocol do you follow as far as CD&T and a worming schedule? EMS, at what dosage do you feed aureomycin and rumensin?
	PeteM	Posted 06/18/12 03:29PM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		Josh we vaccinate with vibro, clemidia and lepto to all of our ewes. First timers we give a second shot about 30 days after breeding. I give the cd/t booster about 6 weeks before lambing. This gives the ewe a booster and the lambs a head start. We worm about 30 days before the ram is turned in and then with Ivomectine around Christmas and them we give a good worming to the ewes when we take them out of the jug.
	PeteM	Posted 06/18/12 03:29PM  Changed 06/18/12 03:29PM
	ARlambs	Posted 06/18/12 04:17PM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		Our vaccination program is pretty much exactly as Pete discribes, we have also experienced the abortion issues, I believe ours were Lepto related. We feed Aueromycin at 250mg/hd/day, we add deccox, but only at Cocci rate, we don't have cats, so little risk of Toxo. The year we had real abortion issues, we switched from aueromycin to AS700 and aortions stopped. The aortions hit the 1st timers the hardest, which in our flock is routinely where the best lambs typically come from, so I would reccomend being proactive, not waiting to see if you have a problem.
	bigiron59	Posted 06/18/12 05:57PM  Changed 06/18/12 06:02PM
		Make sure to have an excellent mineral program in place prebreeding. Mineral shortages can reek havoc with conception rates. This is not time to try to save costs. You can only reap what you sew, and new crops need fertilizer.Mature ewes that have been here a season or more get the vibrio and clymidia mid gestation as well as 1 cc j-vac. They are wormed with Valbenzen and moved to clean pasture 2 days after worming. They will also be fed a 3 day regime of the vit min supplement that Big Gain makes( Pipe vet sells this). Ewes are on free choice salt/min with vits and selemium.Ewes will have been flushed, lenght of time depends on condition, I want the ewes no thinner than 2.5 condition score at breeding in other works , thin ewes I just bought will be fed hard to have them in shape by breeding end of august. They need 35 to 45 lbs of gain by then , so are on feed now. These ewes I can feel every rib and backbone.I do not want to feel that at breeding. I want some "slip"over the rids.Right now your finger would get stuck between ribs. Unless we get rain, we will be drylot by the anyway. I may pull all ewes off grass when I get back from Sedalia, and hope for some regrowth by late august. All ewe lambs and purchased ewes will be vaccinated before breeding with 1 shot of vibrio, clymidia and j-vac, and will receive booster mid gestaion. I will worm ewes coming from pasture with valbenzen after a week on feed in dry lot. My ewe lambs will never be on grass this year, so will not be wormed. We vaccinate for CDT at shearing ( 3 weeks before lambing) We vaccinate ewe lambs before breeding , and booster at shearing. All purchased ewes are treated as ewe lambs.We worm all ewes /ewe lambs lambing in the jug will prohibit, so hope they are clean going to grass. We rotate pasture all summer, hopeing to have at least 6 weeks rest between putting sheep back. This year most pastures only getting 1 grazing, except the first pasture grazed in mid april. Will turm ewes on that , while I am in Sedalia so choreperson(my spouse) does not have to worry about moving sheep, or escapes. My rams were sheared in mid may, and are under fans and shade now. 97 here today,(again) and high humidity. I have seen a lot of rams not sheared, and then the peeps wonder why they can't get ewes bred early. Those guys need to be cool, and fed well, so they are in good condition at turn out. We worm rams after we pull them in fall, and again, mine are drylotted this year, as all pasture has been allocated to mature ewes. So I will not stress them with another worming.The rams have been sprayed with residule fly control and we have a comprehensive fly control program in place, as I have a feedlot across the road, and numerous hog barns in my area, who do nothing for flies. These are the little things that make a big diffence in successful breeding seasons. Vaccinations are very important, but rams, flies,parasites, adn mineral pitfalls will cripple you as well. Good luck. This is my prgram, and I can not remember the last time I had a non breeding mature ewe. We stagger lambing some, but 90 perecnt of my ewes will be bred in the first 17 days after turnout, and we normally run rams only 35 days with ewes, then leave 1 in for clean up. This year I had 1 thinner yearling come back later. She had lambed with twins at 12 months, and lambed with twins at 24 months this year. She will be weaned tommorrow and expect her to breed with the mature ewes in August.She is in good shape now, so should be good to go. I can't really fault her though, with 4 weaned in 26 months.
	EmsoffLambs	Posted 06/18/12 07:30PM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
		Hansen, if you bring in any outside ewes, especially aged ewes, you'd be wise to vaccinate. Abortion is one of those things where you don't have any problems until you do. And when you do, you really wished you'd done something to prevent it. It really is devastating when your ewes start dropping dead lambs three weeks early. Vaccination is cheap insurance. Regarding the Aureo, I personally haven't seen that it's done much good in my case. I had two different disease the past two years and both were trains that were resistant to tetracycline. I switched to AS700 last year and still lost some. However, the recommended preventative dosage is 250-300 mg per head per day. I don't know if I should even bother with it this year or not. I've never used rumensin. It has a narrow safety margin, so you have to be very careful feeding it. I've use deccox instead, which has a wider safety margin, plus also really helps to keep coccidiosis at bay in the lambs later on too. According to Pipestone, you can mix 2 lbs deccox in 50 lbs of salt and feed free choice. That what I've done and will do again.
	Kyhampbreeder	Posted 06/24/12 11:54AM  Changed 00/00/00 12:00AM
	Administrator	CTC is one of those things you don't see all the benefits till you stop using it. IMO most preventative recommendations are on the low side for all the feed additive drugs.

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