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« on: March 24, 2016, 09:56:33 am »
Show season is starting up and people will be looking for OG's Egg Drench. Below is a reply to a post on MyLamb by Gail Christian on his egg drench.
Sheep1..I will be happy to give the mixing and feeding instructions of the "original egg and honey" drench as given to me by Prater Gibbs about 25 years ago..As I have mentioned on this forum and BW forum several times, Prater stated the original drench was formulated by a football coach at a school where he was teaching..seems the coach had his players drink it as an energy drench..I know my coach had us drink raw eggs and honey before track meets as an energy drink..this would be "old school" today due to the multitude of "power drinks" and supplements that are out there...Here again, this drench can be changed up to fit individual needs and there are many varations of it I'm sure...I added the b-12 to the drench after having used the original formula for several years..B-12 does make it bitter and several shows have now eliminated the use of drench guns, so I have stated that if that be the case to leave the B-12 out of it..The reason I added B-12 to it was I noticed from using B-12 as a vaccine and orally, we got an immediate increase in appetite and a lot of energy, therefore, 2-3 days before shows, we would add it to the drench for added energy...Here is the original list of ingredients and then I will list changes at the end and the reason for the changes...30 eggs, one 12 oz. can of Pet milk,24 oz. of water, 4 oz of Mazzola Brand Corn oil, 4 oz. of honey, 4 oz of chocolate flavored ovaltine. mix ingredients with blender,mixer, or ladle..if using the old original backpack drench gun, you have to mix with blender or the egg whites will stop up the gun..if using the commercial hand held drench gun that you just draw the product up into, you can just mix with mixer or with a ladle..Now for the important information and read this close...Due to the fact that raw egg might possess salamonella bacteria,you should keep the product under refigeration or in an ice chest with ice or extremely cold water..if ice melts, water warms up, then discard the product..Also, because of extensive drug testing on the part of some shows, if you use chocolate flavored ovaltine, it could show up because of the caffeine in chocolate and caffeine is a stimulant..if your show drug test, then we recommend using the decafinated brand..if you cannot find decaf. then use vanilla, strawberry ,etc.but use common sense and read the label to see if it has any caffeine in it.These products are like aspirin, some aspirin has caffeine in it, some does not..you have to read the label...I have recently been telling people to be on the safe side, just leave out the ovaltine and add 2-3 more ounces of honey..The purpose of the chocolate was to give it flavor..the purpose of caffeine was to stimulate or give energy..some people have to have the morning cup of coffee to get their day started...personally, I don't drink coffee, because I am diabetic and caffeine turns other things that I consume into sugar, but sugar equals energy...Feeding instructions..This can really vary due to the frame type and body condition of the animal you are feeding it to(we didn't just feed it to lambs, but to our show barrows and gilts, beef steers and heifers, and meat goats)..on lambs we normally would start it about 7 days before the show, however, it might be longer, or in some cases, only start 3-4 days before the show..again, body type and condition would enter into this..We fed our grain wet to lambs and we used 10 oz. of water, therefore we use 10 oz as a bench mark for the egg mix and instead of putting 10 oz of water on our ration twice per day, we would put 10 oz. of the egg and honey...if lambs needed more than this to retore their tops over the rack and loin, then we simply would drench the mixture..again, using up to 10 oz. per drenching...might use only 3-4 oz. if top and loin was not a problem..On lambs that had some middle, or if we wanted to lower weight classification without wrecking the lamb, we would cut grain ration,usually in half, about 5-7 days before the show, then give the lamb 10 oz of the drench, usually 3-5 times in a 24 hr. period..When you cut grain ration, the first thing you loze is muscle, therefore, you have to compensate this loss with something to restore or maintain the muscle...that is why it sure helped on medium framed, heavily muscle lambs that had a middle..we just cut ration, added egg and honey, hand watered using water with electrolytes in it and middle was no longer a problem..In rare instances, if we gave too much, the lambs might scour, we simply just gave 36 cc of Pepto Bismol or Kaopetec..we used a 12 cc syringe with needle removed to drench with..Now, if their is anyting in Pepto Bismol or Kaopetec that could cause your animal to fail a drug test, I'm not aware of it..But, here agin, I always caution you to use common sense, in this case, contact your veterinarian..A good vet to contact and I'm sure Purple Circle readers would agree would be Dr. Bo Knowles, who writes the "In the know with Dr. Bo" articles for that magazine...I do know this, Pepto and Kao. will dry them up in a hurry..sometimes they might bloat if given large amounts of themixture..again, we would dissolve 3-4 alkaselter tablets in about 2 oz of water, drench and they would go down in about 15 minutes...again, not for sure if alka-seltzer could get you kicked out, therefore, contact your vet....More on usage...if we were jackpotting certain animals frequently, we would give them 10 oz. twice per day over their feed, throughout the feeding period or jackpot season...When I added B-12 to the mixture, I put 35 cc in it..the ingredients will make about one gallon..we stored it in plastic jugs such as milk or juice jugs..and hauled it to shows, usually in 5 gallon plastic containers..we or I should say my FFA moms usually did this mixing while we were clipping lambs...Now to my feelings about this product as compared to other products, especially commercial products...The only commercial product I ever used was a product formulated for human consumption and that being Ensure..We did buy a jug or two of the original showshake that was sold comercially..did not see any added benefits and it was a lot more expensive...Now I want to EMPHASISE, I have nothing against the use of Commercial products..There are many out there and I'm sure some of them are excellent products that help the exhibitor to achieve the success they are looking for..I do not want this to become a debate of egg shake/VS commercial products.. upon my retirement and move to the city, I purchased a computer, at the urging of a little grandson. I became familiar with Breeders World and one day someone posted if anyone knew of any good "homemade" show shake recipes..Since I had used the egg and honey shake with success for many years, I posted the ingredients..since that original posting, I have received over 400 emails concerning this shake..I have answered each one of them to the best of my knowledge and ability..Larry Carter, KyHamp, introduced me to this site, MyLamb, several months ago..I'm very grateful to Larry for telling me about it..It is a forum that can be very benificial to our youth, and their parents, involved in the junior livestock program..We as contributors have to be positive in our comments..we have to tell the truth and sometimes we have to use "constructive critism", but it all has to be from a positive standpoint..I have no secrets..when I was an FFA advisor/breeder, if I heard of something or if I was the originator of an idea and it was legal, and it helped exhibitors/breeders achieve their objective, then I was always willing to share, at no cost..This may or may not be an admirable trait, but this is just the way I am and people who really know me, know this is the truth..In closing, I would hope we can"lie to rest" any debate about the egg shake/VS/Final secret, etc.,because it serves no purpose..If someone ask me how to use the egg shake, I will respond. but I do not want anyone to believe that I think it is the only product out there that is any good..I just have not had any personal experience with the use of the othe products...Fair enough?...gail christian
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