Beef and sheep farmers are being reminded to test for liver fluke throughout the season – rather than guessing whether to treat livestock.
Treating too early fails to protect animals – especially following a later than usual start to the liver fluke season, say experts. This underlines the importance of testing when deciding whether and when treatment is required.
“This follows patterns of the last few years, with a lower and later liver fluke challenge than expected in many parts of the country,” says Philip Skuce of the Moredun Institute.
Timing important
The reminder was issued by the Sustainable Control of Parasites in Sheep (SCOPS) and the Control of Worms Sustainably (COWS) groups. Livestock producers should use diagnostic tests rather than relying on guesswork.
“The bottom line is farmers who are sticking with traditional treatment windows in the autumn, for example ewes around tupping, are often giving treatments too early, leaving livestock susceptible to disease,” says Rebecca Mearns of APHA.
“There is no such thing as an insurance policy when it comes to liver fluke treatment. Flukicides have no residual effect, so if livestock are put back on to ‘flukey’ areas after treatment, they are as just as susceptible to picking up infection as untreated stock.
Testing is key to deciding whether to treat and when. The earliest line of attack are tests that identify antibodies on blood (either an ELISA test from a blood sample or Lateral Flow Test (LFT) on ear or nose pricks).
Antibodies
These tests can detect antibodies soon after infection. But they are only suitable for use in this year’s (first) season grazing animals (lambs or calves), because older animals are likely to have had previous exposure to fluke.
Antibodies can be detected for a long time. In practice, younger sentinel animals are used to identify if liver fluke is present in different management groups and/or parts of the farm.
Repeated testing every three to four weeks is essential until there is either a positive result, indicating the need to treat and/or the faecal testing methods become valid as the liver fluke mature within the animals.
Farmers are urged to discuss testing with their vet or animal health adviser before they giving flukicide treatments. For details, visit www.scops.org.uk or
www.cattleparasites.org.uk
Prevention better than cure for calf scour
Good hygiene is important to prevent calf scour which continues to be a challenge in many suckler herds.
Scour is estimated to cost the UK cattle industry £11 million a year and is responsible for around half of all calf deaths. But the knock-on effects can last much longer, with gut damage linked to slower growth.
Rapid spread
Cryptosporidium parvum is now the leading cause of infectious scour in calves, says Kat Baxter-Smith, of MSD Animal Health. It’s one of the most challenging, due to its environmental resilience and the speed at which it spreads, she adds.
Prevention
“The key is to focus on prevention, not just treatment. Good hygiene, the maternal ability of the dam to provide high-quality colostrum, and vaccination all play an important role.”
Beef calves suffering from severe cryptosporidiosis in their first few weeks of life were on average 34 kg lighter at six months old, according to research from the Moredun Research Institute and the University of Edinburgh’s Roslin Institute.
Performance
Lost performance costs around £130 per calf in lost growth and feed costs. “Cryptosporidiosis isn’t just a health issue – it’s an economic one too. We want to help beef producers protect their calves.”
The industry needs to move from firefighting to prevention, because scour is preventable, adds Dr Baxter-Smith.