liver fluke

debra wiltshire · Post by **debra wiltshire** » Sat Jun 26, 2004 12:43 am

can anyone advise on liver fluke? I know that it can be picked up from marshy land or from running water but can it be transfered from cow to unborn calf? Is there any treatment recommended and how serious is the condition? My first posting after feeling shamed by the message left to all us unknown readers....

Duncan MacIntyre · Post by **Duncan MacIntyre** » Sat Jun 26, 2004 9:45 pm

Liver Flukes come in various species of the order of Trematodes, and are generally flat roughly oval shaped parasites which enter the body by the mouth as immature stages and migrate to the liver, living in the liver tissue and damaging it as they make their way to the bile ducts where the mature and lay eggs. The eggs pass via the bile duct to the intestine and land on the pasture in the faeces. When the eggs hatch they enter an intermediate host, usually a snail. Our usuall fluke in the UK is Fasciola Hepatica, though some areas on the West Coast of Scotland also have Dicrocoelium Dendriticum. The latter fascinates me because it has two intermediate hosts - after being in the snail it infects ants, affects them in such a way that they grasp the tops of grass stalks and hence get eaten very easily. But fascination is not the purpose - the purpose of the intermediate host is to multiply the fluke so that many more emerge from the snail than went in - so if no treatment is give the infection can build up quickly especially in a wet year. Wet pasture is needed for the snails, and also the right acidity. Another key point in the natural history of fluke is that they affect many species, for farming the important ones being both cattle and sheep. But deer can carry them, and even humans occasionally if you do not wash your wild watercress!
So if you have wettish grazing, sheep and or cattle, you need to think about fluke control. The main treatments are Fasinex,Combinex or Tribex, which kills adult and immatures down to 2 days in the animal, Ivomec Super, does mainly adults but also a very efficent roundworm treatment, and Trodax, middle of the road as far as efficiency goes, as is Valbazen,another combination product. The range of treatments and the possible timetables for use is obviously very complex and your own vet is really the best person to give the correct relevant advice for your own situation. I t is importasnt to treat if you have fluke as unchecked they can greatly reduce performance in chronic cases and in the situation of really heavy challenge the immatures cause such destruction of the liver that the animal dies. Death may also result from Clostridial infection (Black Disease) which can affect the damaged liver tissue.
This is a bit of an off the cuff reply so not totaly comprehensive - the fluke treatments named are only a selection of trade names and by no means exclusive.

Duncan, too much to say as usual

Sylvia · Post by **Sylvia** » Sun Jun 27, 2004 8:40 am

Debra

Take a dung sample to your vet to check if fluke is on your holding. If you have cows in several fields toddle round and collect a bit here and there. This should show you whether you have it or not. And whether to treat or not.

debra wiltshire · Post by **debra wiltshire** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 6:18 pm

Thanks for the replies...I think a call to the vet is needed..We have recently moved and the land is dry but our previous grazing did have a marshy wet area[

bjreroberts · Post by **bjreroberts** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 6:37 pm

I am happy with general worming to be reactive and worm when necessary, however I am a bit worried about this approach to liver fluke.

My cattle were grazing a wetland nature reserve for one month until the end of November, which was obviously marshy ground and I would have thought prime liver fluke territory!

With the lifecycle described in Duncan's post then surely there will be no evidence no evidence in dung samples until flukes have matured and the damage has been done.

I have one of the animals going to slaughter this month, but if the lifecycle is 13 weeks then there will probabaly be no evidence if they were infected during November.

For the steers I am not too concerned, it is my breeding stock that concern me. Should I not routinely treat them for liver fluke after they have been grazing high risk areas and possibly only graze the steers on there in future?

ann · Post by **ann** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:16 pm

Most of us this year have experienced a very wet summer and I have even heard of cases of dogs picking up liver fluke this year. So far better to be safe than sorry and for the small cost of worming your cattle with a broad spectrum wormer which also covers liver fluke, I would tend to just worm them. As for not worming steers, unless they are near to slaughter, generally young stock is much more at risk, & a worm ridden steer is not going to put weight on if its having to cope with other parasites. as cattle get older they do appear to pick up immunity in many cases and after 2yrs of age I never worm the older ones unless some one is looking poor.

Rob & Alison Kirk · Post by **Rob & Alison Kirk** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:57 pm

Ben.....Our store steers & heifers grazed marshy ground near to a river and prone to flooding last summer. Our vet advised treating for fluke at housing & again 6 weeks later. Not too expensive and worth doing for peace of mind. We have not treated any other animals for fluke.

The animals were under 24 months of age and we will begin slaughtering again next week and are looking well.

We've also clipped a strip up their backs to prevent sweating.

If in doubt seek advice from your vet.

Alison Kirk
Boram Dexters

Martin · Post by **Martin** » Thu Jan 08, 2009 9:55 am

I believe the 'host' snails prefered habitat is water grass, on wet pastures you tend to get small clumps of it. Advice in the past was to rid your pasture of this grass with a weed wiper to reduce the risk of fluke.