Supportive care to keep the lamb hydrated using electrolyte solution. Colostrum feeds should be avoided until gut distention has gone down. Use of antibiotics can be helpful although they will initially cause an increased release of toxins as the bacteria die.
If the lamb or kid is too weak to suck, use a syringe to squirt milk directly into the mouth but make sure not to squirt milk into the windpipe and the lungs. An extremely weak lamb/might also benefit from adding a spoonful of molasses to the milk to provide a quick energy boost in the form of sugar.
Lambs born during a heavy cold snap can exhaust their energy stores just trying to keep warm. They quickly become too weak to feed off their mother and so they can starve and die. But injecting a 20% mix of dextrose directly into the lamb's abdomen can give them the energy boost they need to survive.
Two ounces of a 50:50 mix of corn syrup and warm water through a stomach tube will provide both heat and readily available glucose to a cold lamb. This can be repeated hourly or so if the lamb appears to be responding.
Supplementary feed (e.g. hay, silage, concentrate pellets, or grain) may be given when quality pasture is lacking or when sheep are sick, old, or young and may require extra energy.
If you cannot get veterinary help you can give the animal a home treatment of rehydration fluid. To make rehydration fluid mix six teaspoons of sugar and half a teaspoon of salt with 1 litre of clean, warm water. Give this as a drench (500 ml for sheep or goats) four times a day for 3 days.
This research found that the ewes supplemented with molasses had greater metabolic health (significantly higher glucose, lower NEFA and BHB in plasma, and lost less body condition compared to control ewes). Research has also demonstrated the benefits of sugar supplementation on growth and development.
Some lambs that have not taken to a nipple or lack the energy to drink may need to be fed via syringe and tube. If possible do not force the milk into the stomach with the plunger.
Lambs: Dissolve 1g into 40ml warm water per kg bodyweight, i.e. 5g / 200ml for 5kg lamb. It is recommended that advice from a vet be sought before use or extended period of use. If symptoms persist beyond a few days, consult your vet.
A Baby Lamb With Hypothermia—Cold, Unable to Walk or Stand, and Not Shivering. A lamb that is cold to the touch, especially inside the mouth and just inside the ears, and is not shivering, is almost certainly suffering from hypothermia.
Re: lamb unable to stand? Copper and selenium(white muscle disease) deficiency can both cause muscle weakness/floppiness. I would be asking the vet, as they will likely know what will be short in your area, and can test as necessary.
Mix ¾ cup of water with ½ cup of baking soda and syringe some (carefully) into the lambs mouth. This will help neutralise the gas. Massage the lambs stomach area, this helps the gas move. The lamb may belch or pass gas, this is a good thing.
Waste milk feeding rates
Cow or goat milk may be used in the feeding of lambs, when available. One source might be from treated dairy animals whose milk can't enter the supply chain. One caution is that cow's and goat's milk are both lower in fat (energy).
Signs of an unhealthy animal include isolation from the rest of the herd/flock, abnormal eating habits, depression, scouring or diarrhea, abnormal vocalization, teeth grinding, or any other abnormal behavior.
Lambs need to be tubed with colostrum, or injected with dextrose solution before placed under a heat lamp. Injecting a 20% mix of dextrose directly into the lamb's abdomen can give them the energy boost they need to survive. This technique is known as an intra-peritoneal injection.
With one motion, pinch and pull the lamb's skin by the neck and see if the skin easily returns to the animal's body. If the skin takes a while after being “tented”, the lamb is likely dehydrated and needs fluids quickly.
According to Livestrong, leaving lamb to marinate in milk for a few hours, or even overnight, is an effective method to mellow out that gamey smell. After soaking, you can just pull the meat right out of the marinade and then rinse it before cooking.
Clinical signs of Co deficiency are most commonly observed in weaned lambs at pasture during late summer/autumn. Affected animals show lethargy, reduced appetite, growth retardation, poor wool quality, small size, and poor body condition despite adequate nutrition.
To supplement, farmers hang salt blocks or pour loose salt into feeders. Sheep who don't get enough salt will lick urine, eat dirt, and even chew rocks, wood and metal to satisfy their need for this important nutrient. Minerals are served up with salt because sheep love it.
Findings from a study performed in healthy sheep showed that administration of honey increased serum protein, albumin, hemoglobin, white blood cell counts and neutrophil percentage, while it decreased blood urea nitrogen [110] .
Oats has a 10% lower feed value than barley. This is due to a higher fibre content of oats. For this reason oats is a very safe feed for sheep.
Garlic is a natural antibiotic
I have also used it for sheep with upper respiratory infections that I've been able to catch in the early stages. (I've often used fresh garlic on myself in the early stages of a cold too -- and does it ever work!)
Paracetamol administration has been given postoperatively to sheep recovering from fetal catheterization surgery (Malhotra et al., 2018). Although not an NSAID, paracetamol does suppress prostaglandin production by inhibition of COX.