# When do you worm your lambs for the first time?



## StockDogLovr (Apr 13, 2009)

Just wondering how old folks worm their lambs at. And which wormer is preferred for them?

TIA

Betsy
La Honda, CA


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## PNP Katahdins (Oct 28, 2008)

:soap:
My personal belief is that the best anthelmintic to use is the one that works the best for your flock. Your neighbors can have all kinds of resistance problems and you may not have to deworm at all. It is flock-specific. You can have tests run ahead of time to see if a particular product will work on your flock.

Last year we used ivermectin drench on the flock at shearing (about two weeks before lambing started, had been rescheduled due to bad weather). This was the wool ewes, Katahdins, crossbreds, and the four rams.

The lambs had Valbazen drench once, about 130 days after lambing started. Our adults had ivermectin drench at the same time.

The adults had Safeguard crumbles once during the summer, after weaning.

We had 113 live lambs and lost three that were aborted about a month early, lost two weak ones within the first couple days, and a poor doer died at about 5 months. A brown Katahdin wether went missing at about 3 months, between the 60-day and 120-day weighings, never found a body or evidence. This was our best year for lamb survival rate. 

You can see it doesn't have to take a lot of deworming (some Katahdin breeders think we deworm too much). However we do not have a liver fluke or meningeal worm problem, which really helps. Barberpole and coccidiosis are our two biggest management issues.

Peg.


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## LibertyWool (Oct 23, 2008)

I deworm my lambs at 90 days when they leave the farm for their new homes. I do rotate my dewormers, so it varies each year.


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## goodshephrd (Feb 21, 2010)

I agree it is flock specific. I didn't have much problem with worms and just wormed specific animals.


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## kirsten (Aug 29, 2005)

I worm lambs at weaning time since I am sorting off all the lambs anyway at about 60 days.
I usually do valbazen then.


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