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Welcome to our District Vet newsletter, sharing advice to help you manage your livestock.
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District Dashboard
The most common diagnoses made by our team over the past month and what we expect to see coming over the horizon...
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Pre-joining reproductive disease prevention in cattle + case example of vibriosis
Breeding females producing live offspring every year is a fundamental part of most livestock enterprises; ensuring all the management boxes are ticked before joining gives the best chance of achieving this. A lot of thought typically goes into nutrition and joining weight, but there are also several infectious diseases to be aware of as you’re thinking about pre-joining preparation.
Vicious vibriosis
Earlier this year, a producer in the Young district with a herd of mixed-age Angus cows had only 60% live calves – 20% had late-term abortions (stillbirths) and 20% were dry. They had been served by a borrowed bull and had not been preg-tested, so it was unknown whether the two dry cows had earlier abortions or had never been in calf to begin with.
The live calves appeared healthy, as did all the cows. Nutrition was determined to have been adequate, and they were up to date with 7-in-1 vaccination and parasite control.
The district vet was initially called to investigate the stillbirths – a postmortem did not however reveal the cause. The bull’s vaccination history was unknown, and an organism causing reproductive loss was suspected. After calving had finished, swabs and blood tests were taken from the cows. Results were positive for Campylobacter fetus subsp. venerealis – a bacterial infection also known as vibriosis.
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Getting enough of the rough stuff
With spring well and truly underway and plenty of green feed across the Riverina, it makes you wonder why ruminants would want to eat anything else!
However, like for us a well-rounded diet is essential and including effective roughage in the diet will not only keep the rumen (and animal) healthy, it helps to maximise growth and production.
Rumens need fibre to function optimally.
Prolonged wet conditions like those we have experienced across the region this winter has meant that there is plenty of fresh pasture growth. This growth has high water content and low dry matter content, and it’s the dry matter that contains nutrients required by ruminants.
There should be a minimum of 10-20% effective roughage in any ration. What makes roughage effective? For cattle consuming mixed rations fibre should be ideally 5-10 cm long, and for lambs should be 2.5 cm long. In our pasture-based systems, most fibre sources will at least be this length.
What issues do we see when we don’t have enough roughage?
- Bloat (high risk on rapidly-growing legumes such as lucerne, clovers and medics)
- Increased risk of metabolic disease (low calcium, magnesium)
- Increased risk of clostridial diseases (such as pulpy kidney)
- Red gut in sheep (high risk on rapidly-growing legumes such as lucerne, clovers and medics)
Benefits of including roughage:
- The more fibre in the diet, the more chewing required and therefore saliva flow is enhanced. The contents of saliva buffers the rumen and maintains a healthy rumen pH.
- Higher fibre diets encourage ruminal fermentation and slower ruminal emptying, slowing down the transit time of food through the gut and giving it more time to absorb the energy, minerals and vitamins the body needs.
- Higher fibre sources of feed are slowly fermented in the rumen and contribute to rumen ‘fill’, restricting rumen intake. These can be used in situations where intake should be limited, such as when introducing animals to a new pasture.
Sources of roughage include hay, silage, straw and pastures with mature, higher fibre content plants (reproductive phase)
An important point on sheep: sheep are highly selective in the feed consumed from a variable pasture base, and will select for highly digestible feed with lower fibre content. Therefore when providing roughage to sheep alongside lush spring pastures it is important that this is a suitable quality and digestibility.
How can we assess feed quality and digestibility? Do a feed test! Feed test bags are available at your closest LLS office or can be ordered from NSW DPI laboratory.
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Free chemical resistance testing of maggots off fly-struck sheep
Do you have fly struck sheep? If so, DPI NSW, in collaboration with AWI, are seeking your involvement in an important research project to investigate blowfly resistance to the commonly used flystrike chemicals.
This project builds on earlier blowfly resistance research, conducted from 2018 – 2020, to determine the effectiveness of each chemical group against field submissions of blowfly maggots.
An important outcome from this project will be the development of updated, consistent, and reliable resistance management advice to woolgrowers, helping prolong the effectiveness of existing chemical products, whilst avoiding or delaying the development of resistance of flies to them.
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Are you prepared for flystrike?
Following a wet and magnificent winter, and a proven emerging issue of growing blowfly resistance to chemical preventatives across NSW, the 2022 Spring and Summer are shaping up to be a challenging flystrike season.
Here is your opportunity to learn about how to plan and manage prevention of flystrike in your flock by listening to a leading flystrike expert in NSW, Narelle Sales.
Narelle will not only be updating your knowledge on chemical and management strategies for flystrike but will work through a case study to give you a real-time example of how to plan and manage the upcoming season.
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Sheep Emergency Animal Disease (EAD) Augmented Reality (AR) app
The app ‘Sheep EAD AR’ is an innovative tool designed to help producers recognise signs that could indicate exotic disease in their animals.
The tool uses augmented reality technology to project a digital flock of sheep integrated with the user’s real life surroundings.
Emergency animal diseases included in the app are:
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World leading augmented reality (AR) technology developed in South Australia is being used to assist producers to recognise emergency animal diseases, such as foot and mouth disease in sheep.
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Reminder to complete NLIS Transfers
If you’re heading out to buy rams and bulls this spring, remember that it is the buyer/receiver’s legal responsibility to complete the transfer on the NLIS database.
The exception to this is that if livestock are bought, sold or moved through a saleyard, the transfer in the NLIS database must be completed by the saleyard.
Why does this matter? Maintaining traceability is a requirement of Livestock Production Assurance (LPA) accreditation and ensures the quality of our red meat products.
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Introducing Victoria Buck – District Veterinarian at Temora
Where are you from?
I grew up in Dubbo, NSW. I studied Veterinary Science at CSU in Wagga Wagga, and have worked and travelled around Australia and the UK. We recently moved to Temora from South West Victoria.
What's your favourite part about livestock vet work?
I love working with farmers to help improve livestock health and welfare, and help to improve the overall productivity of livestock.
Why did you become an LLS DV?
To increase my skills and exposure to livestock and farm production systems, and step away a little bit from private practice.
What are you most looking forward to about working in the Temora area?
Such a diverse range of farm productions systems, with a lovely welcoming town and surrounding communities.
What do you do outside of work?
Mostly spend time with my young family, as well as my menagerie of animals. When time permits, I love playing sport (netball), and riding my horse as well as water skiing (in summer), and visiting friends and family.
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WAGGA
Dione Howard - 0428 115 134 or 6923 6300
GRIFFITH
Georgia Grimmond - 0427 418 006
Jess Dalton (Tues, Wed) – 0427 696 895
HAY
Elizabeth Ferguson – 0439 557 567
GUNDAGAI
Kristy Stone (Tues, Wed, Thurs) – 0428 262 112
TEMORA
Bianca Garnham (Mon, Wed) - 0455 489 296
Victoria Buck (Thurs, Fri) - 0457 332 736
YOUNG
Kelsey Sibley – 0499 546 389
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