Very sad day at Little Sprouts

Today we lost one of our Jacob sheep.  This is an unfortunate side of raising animals that cant be avoided completely, but it still tears at your heart when it happens. To make this situation worse, it appears that this death could have been prevented.

About 2 days ago I discovered that someone had left the gate open inside the barn leading to the feed storage area. On that same day we let the sheep out into the yard to graze the green grass there (while we are trying to get the pasture growing again). Unfortunately the sheep found the feed storage and seemed to really like th pig food stored there. I immediately chased them away and locked the gate, not thinking much of it.

Then the night before yesterday one of the sheep showed labored breathing and a sort of humming sound with each breath.  It had no signs of a fight or any physical markings, so since it was late I decided to wait till morning and callt he breeder to ask what to do.  That was a bad choice on my part. The next day I found the little sheep curled up motionless just outside the shelter. It had died through the night.

I contacted the breeder and from the symptoms she deduced that the sheep had contracted "acidosis", which is caused by a ruminate (sheep, cow, horse, or other grass eater) consumes too much grain. The bacteria in their rumen make acid from teh excess carbs in the grain. If too much acid id formed, it creates a kind of pnumonia, which can be fatal.

We could have prevented this death by either being more careful to keep the grass eaters away from grain products, or by recognizing and treating this condition immediartely.  Now it is a sad learning experience.

This experience does once again raise the question, why do factory farms feed grain to cows on purpose? These animals are intended to eat grass and their digestive system is only geared to handle grass. intorducing grain is not beneficial and can lead to death of the animal or the person that consumes the meat after it is butchered. It just doesnt make sense to take that chance.