Living Near Lambs/Sheep When Pregnant

[MintGreenLife]

I live next door to someone who keeps sheep and currently has lambs. I’m aware of the risks involved with lambing sheep/lambs in pregnancy. But it’s not really been an issue until now - one of the lambs hangs around with next doors four dogs (it’s very sweet), but they roam around the yard including in front of our house/gated driveway. I just took the dog out for a walk and couldn’t get out the gate as all four dogs plus the lamb were crowding round. Two of the dogs jumped up at the gate and I patted them both on the head. Next door came and got all the animals out the way and I went off on my walk. It’s only since coming back I’ve looked up properly why lambs etc are an issue in pregnancy and spotted the advice is not to feed or touch them, or to touch any clothing worn by someone in contact with them. Could patting the dogs which hang out with the lamb be the same?! I washed my hands as soon as I got in, but while out for an hour long walk I would have touched my face several time’s to get my hair off of it. I guess I’m just looking for someone to tell me I’m being silly and stop worrying 😕

Farmers have babies too.

It's mainly because of the fluid on newborn lambs that presents the risk. If they're out in the field it should be fine. I used to work on a petting farm and we had to advise pregnant women not to touch the lambs and lambing sheep but they could use their own judgement about it and about going in that barn/touching the pen gates etc.

You'll be fine :)

@cripez of course I understand that 🤦🏻‍♀️

@Edelweiss2020 thanks so much for replying ☺️ So the risk is more imminently after birth? I mean of course I don’t even know if the lamb gets close enough to the dogs to transfer any bacteria etc, but just felt cross with myself for not thinking about it. I didn’t need to pet the dogs 🙄

From what I understand as a PP has said it’s from sheep birthing lambs.

I live rurally(ish) and visit a farm weekly for unrelated work. I’m not allowed near lambing shed but can walk by lambs in field if that makes any sense.

It's the amniotic fluid and placenta which tend to transfer the bacteria, along with other body fluid from the lambs. So if the dog licks the lambs arse then straight away licks you, there could be a risk, but it is still very low. So petting the dogs and then just brushing hair off your face would carry an even smaller risk. Statistically it would be a lot smaller risk than catching covid atm. So whilst you should be careful and practice good hygiene around all animals, unless you are dealing with sheep on a daily basis you are very very unlikely to have contracted anything.

@thefishthatcouldwish thanks for your reply. It’s unavoidable for me at the moment as I live rurally too and they are all in the fields by where I walk the dog. I guess the risk is low and now I’m aware of the situation I can just be a bit more careful with what I touch when out and about x

@SingleTTC31 thank you, that seems like a rational way to look at it! I’ll just try to avoid petting next doors dogs now I know they are in close contact with the lamb, which isn’t easy as they end up all over us and our dog whenever we try to get out the gate. I hadn’t realised until I saw the dogs with the lamb yesterday, but will just take some extra precautions to save myself the worry! X

Totally understand your worry, pregnancy can be a stressful time anyway and there’s always another thing to worry about. You’ll be fine :) but like you say, just don’t pet the dogs again then you won’t give yourself extra worry. It does sound annoying though- you want to be able to get out of your own house without worrying about dog/ lamb ‘encounters’!!

@Chocolatehabit nice to know others understand ☺️ I am finding that at the mo - there’s always something to feel worried about, Covid doesn’t help! Haha yes exactly, bit of a pain! If it carries on I’ll maybe ask the neighbour if there’s a way of stopping them being able to crowd the gate everytime we want to get in/out. One of the dogs jumped the gate yesterday after I shut them out when getting the car on the drive 🙄 x