# ewe nursing 6 day old twins on only one side



## eweinHiscare (Feb 19, 2013)

My Kathadin ewe has 6 day old twins which seem very healthy and active but I noticed she is only
allowing them to nurse on her right teat.
They both stand on the same side and take turns apparently.

I felt her left side yesterday and it just seems empty, not hot or swollen or hard then.
When I bought her last summer her lamb(s) had just been weaned because her udder was still
kind of large and also remember that one of her teats was dark red compared to the other.

My question is:  will she be able to successfully raise these twins on just one side?
As they grow will they need more milk than one side can produce?
or can they make up for less milk by just eating more grass or creep feed?

The ewe is not that tame but I got a collar on her so that I could hold her to check her udder condition.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

thanks!


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## Sheepshape (Feb 19, 2013)

I'm far from an expert, but the same thing happened to me last year, though the udder and teat on the 'unsucked' side grew large and I had to resort to milking her daily. I eventually had to leave her with just one lamb.
It's possible that the suspect side is damaged....Can you milk her from that side? if there's no milk there, then it's likely that she has had mastitis with udder damage (I have a ewe with just one side of her udder left due to severe mastitis). 
Lastly...are you absolutely sure that both sides are not being used? If the left side were in any way normal it would swell up with the day and not go down until 'used'.

Lovely lambs, by the way!


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## Shelly May (Feb 20, 2013)

You can leave the lambs on momma, and bottle feed them at the same time, try to catch everyone up and offer the lambs a bottle, you may have to force the nipple in their mouths the first few times, but if they drink it down fast they are not getting enough milk from momma, so supplementing once or twice a day 4 or 5 onces won't hurt and the rest of the time they can drink from mamma, as the weeks go by yes start them on grain and a good quality hay and they should do well. Might want to give them a CDT shot if you didn't get one in momma when she was carrying them, this will help with over eating disease, don't over feed the bottle milk and cause bloat, also never microwave the milk as it kills all the good stuff in it. Good luck.........


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## eweinHiscare (Mar 15, 2013)

Update!   Good news!   Both lambs are growing well and are strong. 

 They still both stand on the mama's right side when nursing but
one always reaches under her to get to the far side teat on the left.

Apparently the lambs have been doing this since I initially posted, whatever was the problem that

their mama had is over.   Just posting to let you know the situation had been worked out.

I never did bottle feed either lamb because they seemed quite lively and not weak.


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## AgnesGinger (Mar 19, 2013)

They are very cute glad they are doing well!


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