Is this orf?😩

[halfacrehomesteader]

I noticed this on my lambs and thought maybe orf? I can't tell if it's on the ewes teat or not. If it is on her teat I'm assuming I can't milk her? Can I milk the one who doesn't have any signs of it or is that not a good idea? I'm so bummed. We have company coming today and the kids were looking forward to petting the lambs.

 

[halfacrehomesteader]

More pics

 

[Baymule]

A lot of people say Orf is no big deal. The lambs get it, it goes away in 2-3 weeks and they never get it again.
My take on it is that it IS a big deal. It is a zoonotic disease as I suspect you are aware of. You can get it, even your guardian dogs can get it. The scabs are laden with virus and drop off on your land, contaminating it. The ewes become carriers and can give it to their lambs.

If I were in your shoes, I would immediately quarantine the lambs and ewes to help prevent it from spreading over your land. As soon as they were well, I’d haul them to auction. Spray the quarantine area with Clorox, soak it down. Let it dry and soak it down again.

But from a breeder and make sure to ASK if they have Orf in their flock because some do. They don’t exactly volunteer that information.

Diseases are hard enough to avoid without buying disease and taking it home.

I’m so sorry this has happened to you. I’m also sorry to be the one who just shattered your dream. Please keep your dream, you can recover from this.

I recommend the book Natural Sheep Care by Pat Coleby. In it, she discusses Orf AKA sore mouth. She says if sheep have enough copper, they won’t get Orf. Interesting. There is no cure, if this works it would be awesome. There is lots of good information in her book.

I know you don’t want to hear this, but I’m not sugar coating the truth. You can decide to keep these sheep and you may always have sore mouth. You can try Pat Coleby’s mineral mix and see if your sheep have more lambs with sore mouth. Or you can get rid of them, then use Pat Coleby’s mineral mix just in case your new sheep could pick up sore mouth from your land.

Sometimes you got to cut your losses, let them go and start over. Whatever your decision, we are with you all the way and will give you all the support we can.

 

[mysunwolf]

After a year or two, you may see improvement in the severity of the outbreak--as the ewes develop immunity, they pass it to their lambs. Some years will be better than others. If you bring in new sheep, you will probably see a flare up again the following spring, especially in the new sheep.

And yes, avoid milking that ewe (or touching any ewes or sheep without nitrile/latex gloves) until the sores heal up, or the virus can get in your milk and spread that way. You can always leave the lambs on for right now, and when the sores go away in a week or two you can wean lambs or milk share with them then (by taking lambs off overnight) if you'd still like to milk your ewes.

Your company can still pet the lambs with gloves on, and learn about livestock disease and biosecurity! It's a hard truth that if we own livestock, we will see certain diseases at one point or another. Best we can do is manage them and learn from them if possible.

 

[purplequeenvt]

My take on orf with 25 years of sheep experience……

For the sheep, it’s not usually a big deal in terms of their overall health. It’s a virus that will pass on its own. It CAN be a bigger issue if it’s on a ewes udder and she won’t let her lambs nurse or if a lamb gets a bad case and their mouth gets too sore to eat. There are also some strains that are worse than others.

It is zoonotic so it can be passed to humans, that being said, I’ve never *knock on wood* never gotten it from anyone. I wouldn’t say I was ever particularly careful in handling either.

If you show sheep or you bought from a sale barn or a show flock, chances are that you have orf in the flock. Your flock will eventually develop a certain amount of immunity to your strain of the virus and you may only see 1 or 2 lambs with it every lambing season.

Back while we were showing, we actually preferred for the sheep to get orf as lambs because that reduced the chances of them picking it up at a show.

I can’t remember the last time I saw a lamb with orf in my flock. I have added a few new bred ewes this spring so it wouldn’t shock me if their lambs get orf.

I wouldn’t bring home a new sheep with an active case of sore mouth, but I also wouldn’t avoid purchasing from a flock that I knew had sore mouth in the past.

 

[halfacrehomesteader]

A lot of people say Orf is no big deal. The lambs get it, it goes away in 2-3 weeks and they never get it again.
My take on it is that it IS a big deal. It is a zoonotic disease as I suspect you are aware of. You can get it, even your guardian dogs can get it. The scabs are laden with virus and drop off on your land, contaminating it. The ewes become carriers and can give it to their lambs.

If I were in your shoes, I would immediately quarantine the lambs and ewes to help prevent it from spreading over your land. As soon as they were well, I’d haul them to auction. Spray the quarantine area with Clorox, soak it down. Let it dry and soak it down again.

But from a breeder and make sure to ASK if they have Orf in their flock because some do. They don’t exactly volunteer that information.

Diseases are hard enough to avoid without buying disease and taking it home.

I’m so sorry this has happened to you. I’m also sorry to be the one who just shattered your dream. Please keep your dream, you can recover from this.

I recommend the book Natural Sheep Care by Pat Coleby. In it, she discusses Orf AKA sore mouth. She says if sheep have enough copper, they won’t get Orf. Interesting. There is no cure, if this works it would be awesome. There is lots of good information in her book.

I know you don’t want to hear this, but I’m not sugar coating the truth. You can decide to keep these sheep and you may always have sore mouth. You can try Pat Coleby’s mineral mix and see if your sheep have more lambs with sore mouth. Or you can get rid of them, then use Pat Coleby’s mineral mix just in case your new sheep could pick up sore mouth from your land.

Sometimes you got to cut your losses, let them go and start over. Whatever your decision, we are with you all the way and will give you all the support we can.

Thanks so much for the book recommendation and the mineral suggestion. I will definitely being looking into both of those. I am thinking we will just have to ride it out. We are just a Very small homestead and have bonded with our ewes so it would be too hard to give them up. Maybe that mineral mix would be a good option for us!

 

[halfacrehomesteader]

After a year or two, you may see improvement in the severity of the outbreak--as the ewes develop immunity, they pass it to their lambs. Some years will be better than others. If you bring in new sheep, you will probably see a flare up again the following spring, especially in the new sheep.

And yes, avoid milking that ewe (or touching any ewes or sheep without nitrile/latex gloves) until the sores heal up, or the virus can get in your milk and spread that way. You can always leave the lambs on for right now, and when the sores go away in a week or two you can wean lambs or milk share with them then (by taking lambs off overnight) if you'd still like to milk your ewes.

Your company can still pet the lambs with gloves on, and learn about livestock disease and biosecurity! It's a hard truth that if we own livestock, we will see certain diseases at one point or another. Best we can do is manage them and learn from them if possible.

Thanks for the response. I am so bummed about the milk . We milk share with the lambs and I waited till they were a bit older to separate over night for my milk in the morning. I finally was able to get some milk (which is really good I have to say) and now I'm back to no milk again. Hopefully everything clears up quickly so I can start it back up.

 

[halfacrehomesteader]

My take on orf with 25 years of sheep experience……

For the sheep, it’s not usually a big deal in terms of their overall health. It’s a virus that will pass on its own. It CAN be a bigger issue if it’s on a ewes udder and she won’t let her lambs nurse or if a lamb gets a bad case and their mouth gets too sore to eat. There are also some strains that are worse than others.

It is zoonotic so it can be passed to humans, that being said, I’ve never *knock on wood* never gotten it from anyone. I wouldn’t say I was ever particularly careful in handling either.

If you show sheep or you bought from a sale barn or a show flock, chances are that you have orf in the flock. Your flock will eventually develop a certain amount of immunity to your strain of the virus and you may only see 1 or 2 lambs with it every lambing season.

Back while we were showing, we actually preferred for the sheep to get orf as lambs because that reduced the chances of them picking it up at a show.

I can’t remember the last time I saw a lamb with orf in my flock. I have added a few new bred ewes this spring so it wouldn’t shock me if their lambs get orf.

I wouldn’t bring home a new sheep with an active case of sore mouth, but I also wouldn’t avoid purchasing from a flock that I knew had sore mouth in the past.

Thanks for responding. I'm thinking I must have a not as bad strain because there are hardly any scabs on their mouth. I'm actually surprised I caught it because the little boogers are always skipping and hopping around. They are hard to get a close look at.

 

[Baymule]

If you get Pat Coleby’s book, she recommends copper sulfate. There are 2 different kinds of copper sulfate. The one you want is copper sulfate penhydrate.

You have gotten some very good responses, hopefully enough information that will help you with this. I read some more in Natural Sheep Care. Pat Coleby has a recipe for drying up the sore mouth blisters.

2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons of copper sulfate penhydrate
1/2 cup water

Mix well and rub on the sores. I’d say wear gloves and throw them away afterwards.

 

[Baymule]

I took screenshots so you can read what she has to say about sore mouth. Hope it helps.