Monday, March 31, 2025
Tube Feeding
We rarely have to tube feed anything. We pretty much don't tube fed animals that can swallow on their own. Unfortunately, we've known of a few cases where weak lambs or kids may have been killed by tube feeding, not because the tube was inserted incorrectly, but because the little one was given too much at once.
I was taught by a farmer so they taught me to put the baby on its left side to insert the tube (so gravity will help direct the tube into the esophagus, which is to the left of the trachea) and listen and blow into the tube to verify it's in the right place. I'm not sure where our stopper is, but this method seems much more objective than listening or puffing air into the tube. Furthermore, our tube and the syringe have long since become one, so there's no separating them. The gravity method has always worked well on the rare occasions when we've needed to tube feed a little one. If using milk replacer, any lumps can stop the flow of milk through the tube. Also, with older kids, it can get stopped up with grass or other undigested solids. Usually is just a matter of a slight adjustment and/or clearing the tube to get things flowing again. Despite the differences, I think the video is a good one to help be prepared for the rare instances when it might be needed.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=P7PUU1eLZIQ