Orphan+Lambs

ORPHAN LAMBS Welcome to the Orphan Lamb page. This site will discuss the requirements for you if you decide to keep some orphan lambs and give you some ideas on how we have found to best manage them.

We have purchased four orphan lambs for the property. The breed of lamb we have is Romney. The Romney breed was the main breed of sheep in New Zealand in the 1960s with approximately 75% of the national flock. A Romney should produce approximately 5 - 6 kg of course 33 - 37 micron wool. A mature sheep will weigh between 45 - 55kg. The breed is not a known meat breed but is suitable for butchering.

We recieved our orphaned lambs at approximately three days old. They had been fed colostrum prior to us recieving them and had been bottle fed. The four lambs were of various sizes and include a set of twins. All were ewe lambs.


 * Feeding**

Although there are various milk products available, the milk powder product we use is Amlamb which is avaliable from most farm stores. Additionally you will need to purchase bottle teats. These teats fit onto most soft drink bottles. I have included the feeding rate and amount of powder used to mix milk. The



//﻿// Mix the lamb milk replacer @200g/litre of water. Add milk replacer to half of the required volume and mix thoroughly. Top up with water to the required volume ensuring that the temperature of the milk is 40oC. Each bag contains a 40g scoop** (= this makes 200mls of milk) As a guide: ** The correct weight may vary depending on the density of the powder and the level of the scoop. Check with a set of kitchen scales for accuracy. FEEDING RATE
 * Feeding Rates Recommended for Anlamb Milk Powder**
 * ~ Scoops of powder ||~ Milk volume made ||
 * 1 || 200ml ||
 * 2 || 400ml ||
 * 3 || 600ml ||
 * 4 || 800ml ||
 * 5 || <span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: left;">1 litre ||

Mixing rate is constant at 200g/litre

Watch my feeding video here
 * ~ Age of lamb (Days) ||~ Number of Feeds per day ||~ Volume per feed (mls) ||~ Number 40g scoops required per feed ||
 * 1 day || 6 || 100 || colostrum ||
 * 2 to 4 || 6 || 150 || less than 0.5 ||
 * 5 to 7 || 4 || 250 || 1.25 ||
 * 8 to 21 || 4 || 350 || 1.75 ||
 * 21 to weaning || 2 || 500 || 2.5 ||

media type="file" key="Bottle Intro 2.wmv" width="300" height="300"

Watch my mixing milk and feeding lambs video

media type="file" key="Feeding 1.wmv"

DOCKING LAMBS (Tailing)

Lambs should be docked or tailed within 7 - 21 days of age. Removing the tails can assist in preventing fly strike in the lambs. Method that can be used to remove the tails include rings, hot iron and cutting off. The cutting off should only be done with a very sharpe knife and will lead to the animals bleeding for a short period of time. A Hot Iron can be used where the iron is used to remove the tail and cauterises it at the same time.

I have used the rubber ring method to dock our lambs. To do this you will need a set of docking pliers and rubber rings. Some people who may be worries about the pain caused to the animal may administer a local anethestic. The ring is placed on the tail at the area just below the pink 'V' on the underside of the tail. This allows the tail to be long enough to cover the ewes vagina and stop it becoming sunburnt.

Watch my docking video here

media type="file" key="Lamb Docking 2.wmv" width="300" height="300"