Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T20:54:00.270Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Mortality among twin and single lambs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2010

A. F. Purser  and
G. B. Young
A. F. Purser
Affiliation:
A.R.C. Animal Breeding Research Organisation, Edinburgh, 9
G. B. Young
Affiliation:
A.R.C. Animal Breeding Research Organisation, Edinburgh, 9
Get access

Extract

The effects of maternal age and birth weight on survival of twin lambs has been studied in a Blackface and a Welsh Mountain flock. The time of death was also investigated for both singles and twins.

Twin mortality was higher than mortality of singles, mainly due to the lower average birth weight of twins. Twin mortality declined with increasing birth weight although it showed a tendency to increase at the top of the scale. Weight for weight, mortality was similar for singles and twins. Twin mortality declined with increasing age of ewe in a very similar pattern to single mortality.

Lamb mortality was heavy at birth and during the first 14 days of life with only 30% of the mortality occurring after this age. Approximately 12% of the dead lambs were stillborn. Among singles a similar proportion died as a result of difficult births, but this cause of mortality was rare in twins.

Stillbirth mortality rates were very high for very small birth weights and declined with increasing weight of lamb. Difficult births, on the other hand, increased with increasing birth weight. The association of birth weight with mortality was particularly important in the first 14 days of life but thereafter its significance was less.

Although mortality in lambs of younger ewes was heavier than that of older ewes, similar causes of death operated. Younger ewes, however, having lower birth weights tended to have more stillbirths but few losses due to difficult lambings.

Type
Research Article
Information
Animal Production , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , October 1964 , pp. 321 - 329
Copyright
Copyright © British Society of Animal Science 1964

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Donald, H. P. & Purser, A. F., 1956. Competition in utero between twin lambs. J. agric. Sci., 48: 245.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gunn, R. G. & Robinson, J. F., 1963. Lamb mortality in Scottish hill flocks. Anim. Prod., 5: 67.Google Scholar
McFarlane, D., 1961. Peri-natal lamb mortality. Aust. vet. J., 37: 105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Purser, A. F. & Young, G. B., 1959. Lamb survival in two hill flocks. Anim. Prod., 1: 85.Google Scholar
Record, R. G., Gibson, R. G. & McKeown, T., 1952. Foetal and infant mortality in multiple pregnancies. J.Obstet.Gynaec. Brit. Commonw., 59: 471.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Safford, J. W. & Hoversland, A. S., 1960. A study of lamb mortality in a western range flock. I. Autopsy findings on 1,051 lambs. J. Anim. Sci., 19: 265.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shapiro, S. & Unger, J., 1956. Relation of weight at birth to cause of death and age at death in the neonatal period. United States Vital Statistics — Special Reports, 39: 225.Google Scholar
Thomson, W. & McDonald, I., 1956. The relationship of weaning weight to birth weight of lambs. Proc. Brit. Soc. Anim. Prod., 1955, p. 38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Venkatachalam, G., Nelson, R. M., Thorp, F., Leucke, R. W. & Gray, M. L., 1949. Causes and certain factors affecting lamb mortality. J. Anim. Sci., 8: 392.CrossRefGoogle Scholar