Bravoxin vaccination

[Aspiring Peasants]

I've just picked up the 4th dead lamb in as many days which we think is down to clostridial disease. (Am awaiting a PM report). The question is I want to vaccinate the rest ASAP to start the clock ticking towards full vaccine cover but some of the lambs in the batch will be under 2 weeks old. This is the minimum age advised in the Bravoxin literature. Do you think or does anyone have experience of there being problems in vaccinating lambs which are between 1 and 2 weeks old? TIA

 

[Werzle]

Dont think i would give it to anything under a week old. Inject 4 or 5 and if they are alive on monday inject the rest maybe

 

[Bullring]

Don’t know about bravoxin but I used Covexin 8 this year on the lambs instead of heptavac p due to the cost difference and I did 4 lambs at 2 days old instead of the 3 weeks it said on the label purely because when I do the 2nd dose everything will be covered. They survived so they can live to tell the tale, perhaps it’s something to do with immunity being passed from the ewe and after 3 weeks their immunity will have been lower.

 

[neilo]

If the ewes have been vaccinated, they should have passed antibodies to their lambs through the colostrum. If you vaccinate those lambs at under 3 weeks old, that passive immunity will prevent the new vaccine from creating an antibody response. You will think/hope they are covered by the new vaccination program, but they could well not be.

 

[Aspiring Peasants]

Thanks for the replies. Most of these ewes were vaccinated but some were missed. I suppose the only way round it would be to vaccinate them 3 times, now, after 4 weeks and than after another 4 weeks on the basis that you would catch the ones which didn't create an antibody response from the first injection with the third one. I suppose at 50p an injection it's not to costly

 

[exmoorromney]

Bravoxin doesn't cover pasteurella which it sounds like could be the cause of death with the change in the weather?

 

[Aspiring Peasants]

We used to use Heptavac P but were still losing sheep to pasteurella, hopefully we'll get a PM report back soon.

 

[neilo]

Thanks for the replies. Most of these ewes were vaccinated but some were missed. I suppose the only way round it would be to vaccinate them 3 times, now, after 4 weeks and than after another 4 weeks on the basis that you would catch the ones which didn't create an antibody response from the first injection with the third one. I suppose at 50p an injection it's not to costly

Bravoxin is only a 1ml dose, so about 22-23p/dose.

 

[Danllan]

We don't dose ewes as adults, al lambs get Heptavac P and then the follow-up dose and that's it; rams get a yearly booster of it.

My original idea was to do nothing and rely on survival of the fittest, but Mrs Danllan baulked at that and I know my place... ? We've been following my cousin's lead in this, he moved to it before we started with sheep. Most of our lambs now go on as stores, but those sold for stock are on the Heptavac cycle if the buyers want to continue it, as all of last year's did. Done it for five years now and it works well for us.

I'll be interested to read people's thoughts in re Bravoxin and sheep; we use it with the cattle and no complaints, but a fellow not far away had very little success with it in his sheep, Lleyns. Guess it could be a breed thing, his particular place, bad batch or just bad luck...

 

[Aspiring Peasants]

Just as an update which I thought might be of interest. Got the PM back on 2 of the dead lambs and no sign of any disease. One had a tapeworm cyst blocking its airway (possibly acquired in utero) and the other had a congenital defect called Jejunal atresia which apparently is a birth defect in a newborn characterized by partial or complete absence of the membrane connecting the small intestines to the abdominal wall.

Glad did the PM's as now no need to rush in prematurely with vaccinations. Sheep !!