Current TB strategy

Mouser

Member
Location
near Belfast
Not quite sure what your point is - other than farmers get the sh!t end of the stick - we are in agreement.
The fact is to control tb farmers are going to have to get a shittier stick and that seems to be unpalatable to most. Be it TB1 the whole country or more severe testing and movement restrictions on current TB1. Like I said before I believe the second would be more efficient but it will never be allowed to happen due to the effect on short term trade.
Testing makes no difference, we are testing yearly plus anytime a neighbour goes down and every 4 months if there's an inconclusive and God knows what other rules they have. Does nothing to control TB. All it does is get cattle, many that are perfectly healthy, slaughtered before they should be slaughtered and cost the tax payer and farmers a fortune.
 
I agree with what you say however you are incorrect about cattle movement and not spreading TB. Cattle movement do spread TB just look at the current outbreak in Cumbria. The problem now is that it has got into the wildlife. I used to work in the edge area and the vast majority of new outbreaks were attributed to cattle movement. What we also saw in the edge was a gradual creep into clean areas and this was attributed to wildlife spread.

Cumbria had a wildlife reservoir all of its own, described in the Dunnett report in the mid 1980s. It is unlikely to have gone away.
 

Farmer Fin

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Aberdeenshire
Cumbria had a wildlife reservoir all of its own, described in the Dunnett report in the mid 1980s. It is unlikely to have gone away.
Maybe so. But years of no TB then cattle restocked post FMD led to new pockets of infection. You can’t honestly deny that cattle moment is not to blame. We have to be open and honest to get this under control both within cattle and within wildlife.
 
Maybe so. But years of no TB then cattle restocked post FMD led to new pockets of infection. You can’t honestly deny that cattle moment is not to blame. We have to be open and honest to get this under control both within cattle and within wildlife.

Of course if a cow is carrying T.B. when she boards a lorry, the a trip in any direction will not alter that status.
That is why a post movement test is a better screen than a preMT. But crucially, post FMD, the spoligotypes did not seed out. Cattle were tested, slaughtered and that was that.
We are under the cosh re cattle testing and slaughter. What is missing is similar co ordinated action on wildlife.
TB specialists tell me that clusters of farms under TB2 indicate a common source infecting. You can double fence your boundaries and prevent any cattle contact. That is not so easy with our wildlife reservoir.
 

@dlm

Member
Surely it’s obvious it’s a two way thing? I don’t dispute with the badger brigade that cattle give badgers tb, equally they return the favour and return it to cattle, and when it’s a one way cull you are not going to end it? We had a badger living in our parlour overnight 15 years ago, one in calving loose box and one at a farm a mile up road in a disused loose box. Surely not natural habitat for them and a sign of sick animal? Also as many I’m sceptical about the reliability of skin test. The blood test rarely shows positives at abattoir or culture tests but is meant to be an early detection. However annoying if it does remove early positives then it’s great. But to get bloods done it depends on skin test failure that is in my opinion a lottery. Good friend who is a vet, has been testing a dairy herd every 2/3 months for six years. After a couple years run them inside under an afu system, just for his benefit. Changed breeding so he gained on compensation, sounds crap but why not, lose a cow worth a couple of grand to be paid under half I’m guessing or breed a small cheap input cow where compensation is gains you a few hundred quid. But he had a skin failure two months ago that was riddled at abattoir on inspection, oldest cow in herd,vets guess she had been through mid 30s skin tests. They are very interested to see if she’s been spreading it to others for years, as 100s killed since problem, and since change of farming can’t blame wildlife, but if it is her and she has escaped a positive on all those tests then makes test almost a lottery or worthless at times surely?
 

Farmer Fin

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Aberdeenshire
Of course if a cow is carrying T.B. when she boards a lorry, the a trip in any direction will not alter that status.
That is why a post movement test is a better screen than a preMT. But crucially, post FMD, the spoligotypes did not seed out. Cattle were tested, slaughtered and that was that.
We are under the cosh re cattle testing and slaughter. What is missing is similar co ordinated action on wildlife.
TB specialists tell me that clusters of farms under TB2 indicate a common source infecting. You can double fence your boundaries and prevent any cattle contact. That is not so easy with our wildlife reservoir.
Have a read of this.
Cattle movement, testing and wildlife control. All 3 areas need to be addressed otherwise we are never going to get on top of it.
 

exmoor dave

Member
Location
exmoor, uk
Deer don’t excrete the disease like badgers do when they snuffle along close to the ground. Also TB will kill a deer fairly early after contracting it whereas badgers are solid hardy little things and take a long time to peg it, during which they excrete it and spread it wherever they go. Not saying deer don’t harbour it but from what I’ve been told they generally are an overspill species which only gets TB if it’s endemic in the badgers, and they tend to die pretty quickly too.


Deer have become a huge problem around here,
Like you say they die very quickly, but unfortunately that's often in fields, leaving a pool of infection which I believe can linger in the environment for a number of months.

Of course the whole "clean badgers keep dirty badgers out thing" doesn't really work when the deer cover multiple badger territories, if a riddled deer dies in a "clean" badger territory, those badgers aren't going to miss the opportunity of a venison supper!
 
Have a read of this.
Cattle movement, testing and wildlife control. All 3 areas need to be addressed otherwise we are never going to get on top of it.

A good article, which I see was screened by Noel Smith.
Prof. Smith instigated the spoligotype database at VLA Weybridge and produced maps of the 12 main spoligotypes found in GB. These were complied from isolates found in all mammals, including cats, sheep, pigs and alpacas as well as badgers and cattle.

There are links to some of Noel's work in this posting:


and more stuff plus maps here:


Agree with your last posting, and multi faceted programme would get more support from farmers, but mention the 'B' word to an upwardly mobile politician and their eyes glaze over.
There are more votes to be lost in a dead badger than a dead cow, when the real target should be the disease itself.
 
Then we have one of the countries largest landowners (NT) undermining the cull and leaving their tenants herds and (even worse) surrounding non-tenant herds at the mercy of large numbers of infected badgers and deer.
Really the Government must surely step in and order the NT to get on board

It was 'the government' which stopped the Derbyshire cull in its tracks. Or it is said, one Carrie Symonds, latest squeeze of the Prime Minister, having met with the badger Trust's CEO.
 

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quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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