Ram yearlings sudden loss of appetite and all sheep licking stuff

Sorry for the title, it's hard to know how to label this. Could you help me brain storm what's up with my rams? Both are still drinking, eating grass and chewing cud, so it's not as urgent as it could be...however...

I have two Icelandic ram yearlings living together. They have just over 1/8th acre pasture right now, which has some grass in it, but it's still short from winter. We supplement with local hay year 'round. As well they have constant access to commercial cobalt block lick and commercial powdered mineral/salt lick. They are obsessively protective of their cobalt lick, and use it several times a day... the powdered minerals not so much.

Yesterday the dominant ram didn't eat any hay, allowing the lesser ram free access to it. This is very unusual! Today neither will touch the hay. The hay is from the same bale they have been eating from all week, so no change in bale or batch of hay. Don't think anything is wrong with the hay as the ewe flock is still munching away at it as per normal.

Today the boys look skinny, their bellies are sunken and there is a bit of a narrow hollow either side of the spine... not sure how to describe it, but usually the bellies are higher and tighter when their digestion is normal.

The lesser ram has a bit of a stiff gate/walk in the back left leg, though his twin died from hernia so I imagine this could be the problem there. This ram also is laying down a lot more. I get him up, he wonders around, chews some grass or cud, then within 5 min, lays down again.

Both rams have more clumpy poop than normal, the greater ram just hard clumpy, the lesser ram mushy clumpy.

They are still nibbling at pasture, chewing cud, drinking water, licking their lick. However, they are also licking my fingers (when I let them into my personal space, they are rams afterall) and metal gates... especially the zinc coated metal. Usually they lick my fingers if their cobalt block is nearly finished (edit: it's about half done).

Infact, the ewe flock (who is on the same minerals and hay) has also taken to licking my fingers the last few days.

More background - the ewes have had their worming meds this spring, Safeguard. The boys haven't had their worming meds yet as I was waiting on someone else to get the meds in... They usually have Ivermec or however you spell it, but I'm beginning to worry it has lost it's effectiveness, so I'll be switching to Safeguard for my rams this year too. Locally we have a selenium deficiency in the soil. I've ordered Kelp meal from the feed store and hopefully it will be in today.

I'm guessing mineral deficiency or worms.

Other possibilities to me would be the quick changes in temperature we have this time of year: 25C and dry yesterday, 15C and damp today... but their breathing seems normal.

I did a walk of the ram pasture, no toxic or poisonous plants I can see, except for these little silver mushrooms which the lesser ram was eating that must have come up in the last day or two. I stomped down the mushrooms as I don't know what they are.

Maybe the neighbour feed them something? We aren't on good terms and they seem to think that they know what they can and cannot feed our animals - we've had serious health problems with them and our animals before, including my poor rescue llama losing all his teeth from being fed horse treats. They clipped their high chemical lawn yesterday, but I didn't see them put anything over the fence. I was watching carefully. The neighbours are bullies so I can't accuse them without solid evidence.

Anyway, can you help me narrow it down? What else should I pick up from the feed store to help them?

At what point should I make a vet appointment? Budget is a very tight right now, so anything I can do myself is best... but then again, the greater ram is my breeding ram, so I need him healthy!

Check their temperatures.

Why feed a cobalt block and a loose mineral? Cobalt is such a minor mineral required for sheep, I wouldn't even worry about it. Feed only one mineral, a loose mineral, labeled for only sheep. I feed Southern States' brand loose sheep mineral.

According to other local shepherds, cobalt is another one of the minerals we really lack here. I've noticed the fibre quality improved dramatically when we started the cobalt lick. Both mineral licks are the local sheep brand - by local, I mean the Western third of Canada, which really isn't designed for our little island. For example, closer to the Rockies they have an excess of selenium in their soil, and often lose sheep to selenium toxicity, whereas here there is almost no selenium and the lambs drop like flies if they don't have some extra selenium supplement.

I'm actually considering doing one of those lick stations that Pat Coleby recommends, only adjusting the minerals for our local conditions. The commercial licks we get here are inappropriate for our local conditions that I already have to order in extra of this or that mineral. My sheep are all primitive breeds and they seem to have a handle on which minerals they need when. They do so much better with a choice of mineral licks than just one or two. Still need to do more reading and research before I try it. I really want to get my hands on some of her primary resources and read them for myself.

In other news: gave the feeder a good cleaning and opened a new bale of hay. The boys ate it with moderate interest - which is better than before. However greater ram let lesser ram eat beside him - this is almost unheard of! They spent a good half hour slowly chowing down, which made me happy, but they still are licking metal and seem a bit 'meh'. Can't really put my finger on a specific symptom, but they seem off somehow. Hope to catch one later and check his eyelids for anemia.

They are still nibbling on pasture, lesser ram is now up and about more than he was this morning, but not upto normal standards yet.

Great big happy face ... now how do I use emoticons on this forum?

There we go.

Gave the rams something called Farm Salt (which is iodized salt) and kelp meal. They loved both of them and had a good amount of each... lick a bit, look up at me and do that chomping motion that means they approve, lick some more... and so on.

Within an hour, they had their appetite back. Four hours later they were running and jumping like yearlings do, playing dominance tag. This morning, their shape is much improved, stomach still a little saggy, but definitely on the mend.

In many ways, this is just another example of when the commercial mineral mixes have let me down. I don't know if it's just because of the soil is so different on our island or because my sheep are pre-industrial breeds, but I think it's time to do some more research into mixing my own minerals.

Icelandic's have a really high requirement for cobalt so extra supplementing if you are in a known low cobalt area is the way to go.

Do you have any Icelandic people to help give you advise? They have pretty different mineral requirements than other sheep. They are more goat like in mineral requirements.

In particular, they do need some copper which causes some sheep people grief because normally copper is a big no no in sheep. The big 3 minerals of concern for Icelandic are Selenium, copper, and cobalt. Most of the big names in Icelandic sheep have a regular copper supplement, either they feed some goat mineral or occasional Red Cell dose if you have other sheep that must avoid copper. It's the first thing they ask on the Icelandic group if you have a dull sheep. "Do you give him any copper, cobalt or selenium??"

Anyway you might know that already but if you are mostly experienced with regular sheep care you might not know that. They are extremely hardy sheep but developed in a region with much more mineral rich soil than most places, due to the volcanoes there.

greenmulberry said:

Most of the big names in Icelandic sheep have a regular copper supplement, either they feed some goat mineral or occasional Red Cell dose if you have other sheep that must avoid copper. It's the first thing they ask on the Icelandic group if you have a dull sheep. "Do you give him any copper, cobalt or selenium??"

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What 'Icelandic group', please? And thanks for the good info!

https://www.facebook.com/groups/Icelandic.Sheep/

I love it! You should join for the photo album alone! Several of the major breeders hang out there and are so helpful.

Apparently there is also a Yahoo group for the Icelandic Sheep Breeders Association of America, but you have to be a member to join and I haven't gotten around to that yet.

Pitty about it being facebook - oh well. I'll have a look out for the yahoo group.

Boys are doing better, getting excited about meeting the girls. They get extra cobalt and Se already, but the copper is still at 'recommended' levels.

I'm looking into giving them a free choice lick station, like Pat Coleby talks about in her book Natural Sheep Care. The other sheep I have are Black Welsh Mountain which is also has high copper tolerance and need.

trampledbygeese said:

Pitty about it being facebook - oh well. I'll have a look out for the yahoo group.

Boys are doing better, getting excited about meeting the girls. They get extra cobalt and Se already, but the copper is still at 'recommended' levels.

I'm looking into giving them a free choice lick station, like Pat Coleby talks about in her book Natural Sheep Care. The other sheep I have are Black Welsh Mountain which is also has high copper tolerance and need.

Click to expand...

I'm going to look for that book. ..thank you!

I only ever used the kelp meal and coarse salt for my hair sheep and it seemed to keep them very healthy. For extra selenium, I would feed them a couple cups of BOSS every week.

What I found with the kelp and salt is that when I put it out they'd eat from it a quite a bit until their mineral needs were met, then they'd just sample it lightly until it was all gone over time.