Green Is Our Favourite Colour

It’s rained, so naturally people will be looking to buy cattle.

Just a word of warning: every year we see disease outbreaks in newly purchased cattle that are mixed origin cattle transported long distances, mainly from the south. I see around 3-4 cases per year - while this is not a large number, the death rates are spectacular, and the outbreak is costly.

We mainly see respiratory disease in the first 14 days post-arrival. This is usually caused by the viruses and bacteria that normally live in the respiratory tract of the animal, which flare up as the animal is stressed, off feed or fed poor quality hay, mixed with other cattle and transported long distances with its head raised. Ruminants are meant to graze for more than 10hours per day with their head down for optimal respiratory drainage and health. Respiratory disease can be quite subclinical if the animals are not examined closely, and often the first clinical sign is a dead beast, and there are many more to follow. Because it is hard to identify animals that are sick, the best option is to treat the whole mob which is costly, time consuming and a big day in the yards.

We also see sickness after arrival present as Salmonella scours. Salmonella is a gastrointestinal tract inhabitant which flares up when animals are exposed to the same risk factors - congregation, time off feed, transportation. It presents as profuse, smelly scours but again sometimes the first sign is a dead animal. Blanket treatment is also the quickest way to disease resolution.

I’m sure that immunosuppressive diseases such as Bovine Pestivirus underly all of these outbreaks, but it’s hard to know what to do about this considering that the animals have already been mingled and are probably incubating disease by the time they arrive on your farm. A vaccination on arrival for some diseases such as Pestivirus or BRD is probably too little, too late. Having said that, a good solid induction protocol that considers the risk of the cattle you’re introducing is essential and we can help you with that.

If you’re chasing cheap cattle, the risk of a disease outbreak is probably something that you’re willing to risk. After all, for the 3-4 cases of disease I see per year, there are probably hundreds of trades that occur with no problems. If you’re more risk adverse you may prefer to only buy single line, vendor bred cattle that travel direct from the property of origin to your farm.

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