# Orphan lamb ruminating??



## hannah208478 (Apr 22, 2020)

Hello,
Looking for some guidance.  We have an orphan lamb (4 and a half weeks old).  She has been bottle fed approx. 1000ml over the course of a day every 4 hours.  This week she has been very interested in pellets and grazing much more than normal.  She is in a field with other lambs and 2 ewes.  She wasn’t interested in her milk this morning and then 4 hours later she wanted to drink but she would stop every few sucks.  We phoned the vet to see what they  thought - he said could just be that she is ruminating and her gut is contracting so gave her a small muscle relaxing injection to help her deal with it.  She’s in fine spirits, her stomach hasn’t changed size (e.g bloat) and has had about 400ml of lamlac along with 2/3 handfuls of pellets.  I just wondered if anyone else had experienced this before? Is she not interested in her bottle because her stomach is changing? Is this common because I cannot seem to find anything anywhere else! 
thanks 😊


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## purplequeenvt (Apr 22, 2020)

She may be filling up on “real” food and isn’t hungry for milk. She might be starting to self-wean so as long as she is pooping, peeing, and otherwise seems happy and healthy, she’s probably fine. 

At 4.5 weeks, you should drop her feedings to 3x a day rather than every 4 hours.


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## hannah208478 (Apr 23, 2020)

Thank you!! She seems to be a lot more chipper today and was keen for her milk so you may have been right RE filling up on grass/pellets etc.


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