When a fool attempts a castration she saw in a book~Update...

[Beekissed]

Just thought I would post an update and give report on the condition of this lamb. His scrotum became inflamed...and no wonder from all the fiddling and bumbling down there!

I banded the scrotum and just watched it closely. It turned black and the flies were starting to bother it, so I doused it in vanilla extract and the flies bothered him no more.

He is currently hopping around like a...well...like a lamb! He has packed on tremendous amounts of weight and, though his scrotum is still hangin' on, it looks to be dried up and free of infection.

He has become the terror of the farmyard and chases chickens when he takes a notion...one chicken in particular is his victim, poor thing! He has become more aggressive in his nursing techniques, which could explain his massive weight gains.

So..for now, crisis averted. Thanks for all the support you all gave me when I was feeling quite stupid and heart sick!

 

[manybirds]

We all make mistakes, thats how you learn with animals. No book can teach u about alot of it. Banding is always best, in my limited experiance. But look at it this way u didn't kill him and now he's fealing better and you know bettere than to do it again. sorry i'm not known for being very sensitive. if i misspeled i can barely keep my eyes open.

 

[manybirds]

sorry about the poorly spelled post last night. it was 1:00 and I get up at seven so i was a wee bit tired

 

[Natisha]

Just wondering if the lambs are sedated during this procedure or is some kind of block used?

 

[redtailgal]

x

 

[freemotion]

Pssst.....that was over a year ago and I think she ate that lamb......

 

[redtailgal]

x

 

[aggieterpkatie]

Natisha, typically they're not given pain meds. When we did it on the farm where I worked, we did give lidocaine and banamine, but that's not feasible for most large producers.

 

[SheepGirl]

Natasha, when we band our lambs (not surgical castration, as described in this topic) we don't give pain meds. We have castrated all the way from day 2 to day (I believe) 72. They seem uncomfortable for about a day (laying down and being lazy) but afterward they are back to normal, jumping and eating and doing what lambs do. But that's us banding in the evening (around 5 pm during feeding) and checking on them in the morning (6 am) or the evening again. They could be feeling better before then, but we don't go out to check to see exactly when they're acting normal again.

 

[Beekissed]

Pssst.....that was over a year ago and I think she ate that lamb......

Yep....he grew to be a fat little sweety and never missed a beat after the ACV tonic I gave him. He started to fatten up immediately after that and was a very tasty sheep in the end.

No, we didn't use anything to numb him and I'll never do a surgical castration again...the banding is so easy and non-invasive that it isn't really necessary. For the life of me, I don't know what I was thinking when I did that...something Salatin said in some book may have convinced me to castrate that way.