Cattle Management - what do we do? - Throughout the lactation?

nuttalls · Post by **nuttalls** » Fri May 22, 2009 11:53 am

hi saffy, yes the bantams are dutch, we paid 20.00 for the last 2 lots at york,there was some lavender that made more. jean might be intersted if you have afew

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Fri May 22, 2009 7:14 pm

For the plant shown, I wondered first about a young burdock plant, or perhaps something similar to butterbur?

There are very many plants which technically are poisonous, but in practical terms rarely do any harm. It seems much more likely to me that there is some clostridial disease or pasteurella involved, even if the flock is vaccinated.. ask your vet for an opinion.

Duncan

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Fri May 22, 2009 8:18 pm

Thanks Duncan,

I think you may well be right. The burdock suggestion kind of rings a distant bell with me, I didn't think of it as a poisonous plant when I saw it - just as one I couldn't identify that had been chewed and wondered. There are others the same as it to be found here and there about the place in other fields and on the side of the drive.

How reliable is vaccination? I am very careful to make sure that the injection has actually gone where it should go and these days of only having a handful to do it is easier. However we do use the left over vaccine from a big flock but on the same day, I used Heptavac P.

Anyway our vet is visiting to do a TB test soon I shall ask questions then. :D

Stephanie

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Fri May 22, 2009 9:07 pm

Hello Stephanie,

in this part of the world we see quite a number of pasteurella cases despite vaccination, it seems difficult to get high antibody levels to some strains of pasteurella. We see it mostly in ewe hoggs in the autumn when the move from the hills of Argyll to the dairy farms on Bute for wintering. Difficult to say how many are vaccinated as some have stopped doing it because they were suffering the losses anyway. Clostridial vaccination probably more reliable. The strict times put on use of vaccine after opening the bottles now is not to do with loss of efficacy, it is due to fear on the part of the manufacturer that infection will be introduced and because there is no antibacterial stuff in most vaccines any bacteria introduced will multiply and create an infection at the injection site.

Duncan

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Fri May 22, 2009 9:49 pm

We've only ever had mastitis in the back two quarters of one cow where the teats were quite close to the floor and she had a calf at foot that wouldn't suckle the back two teats. I have to admit we don't do anything re drying off. We wean as late as possible though. I would imagine that if you wean earlier, then maybe it's more of an issue.

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Woodmagic · Post by **Woodmagic** » Sat May 23, 2009 8:01 am

Summer mastitis is the real bug bear,and in this case it can occur in the dry animal, and even in heifers. I have recently been approached by a smallholder who hadn't appreciated the problem. Luckily she asked me and went to her vet immediately, or she could have had a very sick heifer. Like other diseases it is less prone to seasdonality than it uised to be, and should be watched for at all times.

nuttalls · Post by **nuttalls** » Sat May 23, 2009 9:11 am

hi saffy, yes poisin,s our texel,s pushed their way out 2 years ago off down road i went to get them and within 24 hours and less 2 were dead rang the vet because they were in lamb and lambs at foot at 5am she told me they would die, what to do,and it was a day of hell, frothy mouthed and groaning, so i would say your,s had something else jean jordeth

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Sat May 23, 2009 10:13 am

Lots of green froth and vomitting instead of bringing up cud is the usual feature of rhododendron poisoning, common in sheep if they have not much else to eat but usually not too dangerous to have a passing contact if there is plenty grass. Tends to be seen in snow or when sheep break out into area with lots of rhododendron and not much else. I have seen it in goats as well. They can be treated with atropine and lots of tlc, vit b comples etc. but do not always survive especially if the vomitted ruminal content is inhaled and causes a pneumonia.

Duncan

Bridgehouse · Post by **Bridgehouse** » Tue Mar 23, 2010 10:43 pm

Just a quick query re drying off. I had five cows to dry off and there calves ranged from eight to nine months old. I shut them in the shed and yard next to the calves in the field. Four of them seem to have loose udders and drying up. One however is still filling her udder. She has been apart from her calf for ten days now, I am not sure if it was advisable but after 3 or 4 days I did put this cows calf in with them just to ease her udder. I am unsure whether I should just leave her be now or should I be concerned? Can mastitis be a risk if the udder becomes full before she dries off?

I have fed them on straw to help stop milk production. I have read on here that some people just split them up in the field. Do they dry up ok when on grass?

It certainly has been a noisey few days in the rearing of cattle as mum and calf communicate!

Any advice and personal experiences much appreciated.

Thanks
Mark

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Tue Mar 23, 2010 11:16 pm

I think you did the right think there Mark.
The ideal would be to put the cows far enough away that they cannot see or hear the calves, they are less likely to make them milk that way but we can't all do that.
The very best way to guard against mastitis in the dry cow would be to administer a dry cow tube to each teat, you can get these from your vet but I don't think many single suckler herds use them.
I try to put my newly dry cows as far from the calves as possible and I do use the tubes but that is because I am used to using them in the dairy herd.

Stephanie

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wagra dexters · Post by **wagra dexters** » Wed Mar 24, 2010 3:26 am

Mark, we just weaned a bull calf from a heavy-milking cow and I have had the same concerns with her. We wean into yards where the mothers can come up and see them for the first couple of days. When the cows don't bother coming back, day 3 or 4, we bring the calves home where they are halter trained. Our calves aren't domesticated at all before weaning in autumn.
We allow this cow into the yard on the first two or three mornings after seperating, and we control the situation so that her calves take just a small amount from each quarter. This is her seventh calf following the same routine so she knows the ropes. She didn't come back to the yards on the third day so we moved the bull home on the fourth. The cow lets us check her udder for heat without having to get her into the yards. I hadn't thought about using Dry Cow as Stephanie suggests. It makes good sense with such a heavy milker. She will milk all the flesh off her bones if we let her, but she is getting older and winter is getting closer. She needs to keep some condition on to stay warm.
I have never heard of shutting the cows away instead of the calves, but we farm under very different circumstances.
Margaret.

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Wed Mar 24, 2010 3:27 am

We've got 60 breeding females and have never done anything and never had a problem. Out in the field we wean just either side of a fence, then after a few days we can move them elsewhere or leave them where they are, whatever.

I had no choice but to wean a bunch recently out of site but just the other side of a brick wall. Not good. It took ages for them to get over it, bellowing for a week or more, but still no problem drying up.

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wagra dexters · Post by **wagra dexters** » Thu Mar 25, 2010 2:32 am

We've never had a problem either Clive, but I'm clutching at this heavy wooden desk as I say that!
Margaret

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Thu Mar 25, 2010 10:22 am

Whether or not problems arise with mastitis in the dry cow will depend on many things, for instance:

How much milk they are still making.

Time of year - summer flies and heat make it far more likely that they will get summer mastitis and loose a quarter or worse.

Where they able to lie down, if it is clean and dry they are less likely to get problems.

Age makes a difference because the older cow is more likely to have a high mastitis cell count in the first place.

My reasons for using dry tubes are mostly that I used them for my milkers and I am a little "institutionalised" BUT also when I first looked at Dexters I did see some old timers with just one or two quarters. I don't want that to happen to mine, if I can prevent it and since I am used to using the tubes I don't want to take the risk of loosing a cow to summer mastitis either.

Stephanie

Broomcroft · Post by **Broomcroft** » Thu Mar 25, 2010 12:10 pm

We have mad mastitus just once thinking about it, but that was when a calf was on the dam. Cow was a shortie with the back two teats very low, calf didn't suckle them and she got mastitus in both rear quarters even though out on fresh grass. She reared the calf but then I culled her.