Hi, after avfew years of lambing, we just had our first triplets yesterday. All good and active now after a bit of fuss. Mum feeds all three and is amazing with them. Should I start suplementing with a bottle to help the ewe or just leave her to it? She has dry feed ad lib and high quality hay plus energy bucket.
Triplet lambs - can they all stay with the ewe?
- Thread starter Kat4444
- Start date
They always look good to start with. Things come unravelled later on. Peak lactation is about 4 weeks post lambing, either the lambs suffer equally, result, 3 poor lambs. One may get pushed out, result, 2 good lambs, one dreadful or dead lamb. Or the ewe will milk hard off her back, get very poor, then may be a struggle to get her right again after. Take one off once they've all had some good colostrum, leave her with an even pair and enjoy the pet lamb!!
Thank you. Only single is a week old. We are lambing in a polytunnel so it is easy to look after the ewe and the lambs. What age should I offer creep to these lambs? Last year we had a ewe with twins that had only one milk duct active and I left both lambs with her, but gave a supplementary bottle a few times a day. Both lambs and mum did well and it saved me a lot of work too. This is our last year lambing and only lambing 8 ewes so I can introduce creep any time and just put all the lambs in a pen to feed on it a few times a day without the ewes pushing them away.
How early do you wean them? I can give them a bottle to supplement - all the lambs we ever gave bottle to help, absolutely thrived.
- Location
- Western Washington
I would say it would depend on the ewe and how she is being managed. Some sheep produce enough milk for quads just off of well managed pasture. With the right sheep and forage genetics and pasture management, you can wean quads off their mums at 120 - 150 days old.
Watch out for the two lambs that are bigger out of the litter. They will muscle the smaller lamb(s) off the teat and take it for themselves. If that happens you can still keep the smaller lamb(s) with their mum and group but you will need to supplement the muscled out lambs with a bottle for a few weeks so they can become equal in size to the lambs that are taking most of the milk from their mum.
While powdered milk keeps them going and can put weight on them, there is really no comparison to actual mums milk.
We have about 15% of our ewes have triplets every year. For most part, only a couple of the lambs need supplement with a bottle for no more than 1 month.
icanshootwell
Member
- Location
- Ross-on-wye
I find the earlier you lift a lamb, the easier to get it sucking a bottle or feeder, had 8 sets of triplets so far only two ewe,s have all 3 still with them, not all ewe,s can feed 3.
That’s what works best with me. Someone on YouTube was saying that they leave them on a week.
Do you think lift one as soon as it’s dry or after it has a suck?
- Location
- Mendips Somerset
go in with a bottle try all three for few days if you have time if one sucks ok take that one off , nothing worse than a milky ewe that feeds all three well for 2 -3 weeks , then none will take bottle and one or more end up poor or die , or worse she gets mastitis ,then your in trouble
- Location
- Fife
I leave them
- Location
- north Wales
Another outcome is because she has 3 lambs constantly trying to feed she gets damaged / sore teats, stops them sucking then gets mastitis!
I used to leave up to 30 sets on before buying a automatic milk feeder, now it's easier to pull 1 off most of them
- Location
- Montgomeryshire
I always lift one as soon as it’s had a belly full of colostrum, then straight onto the machine in a small/training pen (assuming there’s no foster ewe ready). The younger they go onto an artificial teat, the easier they take to it ime. Leaving them on the ewe for a week sounds like making a lot of work for no reason.
I never, ever, leave triplets on, having tried it too many times. Best to do two properly than three badly, or worse.
icanshootwell
Member
- Location
- Ross-on-wye
Depends how busy i am, I alway give all triplets colostrum as soon as possible, then lift the weaker one off and put on a feeder, probably 12 -24 hours after birth but that may vary, i had one lamb that hurt its leg because the ewe kept on pawing it to get up, that one came straight off.
muleman
Member
Yes it ruins the sheeps bag with three lambs fighting for 2 teats , best taking one off as soon as its had colostrum
Coximus
Member
You can - Ive found if the spring grass is through, they often manage with access to a lick bucket and maybe throw some beet in to help along.
This early - I would separate out, ensure the lambs have creep after 2 to 3 weeks so theyre not hammering the mother too hard, and make sure mums got good grass, adlib good hay and an energy bucket.
DO not be afraid to wean 1 or 2 of them off mum if she starts to loose condition or the lambs start laggig.
This early - I would separate out, ensure the lambs have creep after 2 to 3 weeks so theyre not hammering the mother too hard, and make sure mums got good grass, adlib good hay and an energy bucket.
DO not be afraid to wean 1 or 2 of them off mum if she starts to loose condition or the lambs start laggig.
- Location
- Herefordshire
If the ewe is milky we leave them on after ensuring each lamb has had 200ml of colostrum in the first couple of hours.Creepmis offered at a fortnight old and generally they make it,mother and lambs, although they may take a little longer to finish.It beats buying bag after bag of milk powder.
These are big strong Suff x Mule ewes.
These are big strong Suff x Mule ewes.
Great. Thank you so much. Got the bottles and will take to the lambs later. So far all 3 are feeding equally, and at the moment just focusing on mum having everything she needs to eat. I have a camera with an app on my phone soncan keep a close eye on them. Totally agree that being with and feeding from mum is the best and we had that scenario with twins last year with a ewe that only had milk on one side. She was good with the lambs so we left them with her and just gave them a bottle twice a day. It worked well.