Heamonchus ! Advice & experience wanted.

Frank-the-Wool

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
East Sussex
I sat in on some discussions/reports about this at Moredun a few years back & it seemed a lot of hard work with a fairly low success rate ---only 65% ''kill rate'' ???

It may initially have only been 65% but in reality it has been much more successful.
The sales of the vaccine has been increasing significantly.
 

bill.bt

Member
I you sure you have not got a johns problem starting they do not scour in sheep,same symptoms as having severe fluke or aneamia.THey have a massive worm burden which spreads across the land they are grazing.The lambs pick it up off there mothers ,or off the infected sheep when grazing same pasture.been a big problem in parts of aus till they had a vaccine.GET some separate samples off the poor peforming sheep in the gang and send to lab to test for johns.Hope it helps you.
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
I you sure you have not got a johns problem starting they do not scour in sheep,same symptoms as having severe fluke or aneamia.THey have a massive worm burden which spreads across the land they are grazing.The lambs pick it up off there mothers ,or off the infected sheep when grazing same pasture.been a big problem in parts of aus till they had a vaccine.GET some separate samples off the poor peforming sheep in the gang and send to lab to test for johns.Hope it helps you.

We’ve been doing some monitoring recently as part of a Welsh Govt funded program and have checked lean ewes for Johnnes, OPA, fluke, etc. All coming back negative (as expected) so happy to rule that out.👍

We don’t have big issues with worms in lambs here, despite being ‘sheep only’. Most pastures that are used for rearing ewes & lambs have mature ewes rotated round post weaning, hoovering up nearly as well as cattle. Of course, Haemonchus isn’t as cooperative under that regime.:(

Onwards and upwards. Diagnosing the problem at least allows us to formulate a plan, hopefully one that doesn’t entail massively increased use of anthelmintic, accelerating selection for resistance.:(

Neighbour had the problem last year and has gone to creep feeding everything away as quickly as possible, which is one option of course.
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
Something reminds that you have to be careful about dosing anaemic sheep with closantel?

We unknowingly bought in haemonchus with some ewes that had been ridiculously overstocked. Never seen anything like it with sickness and deaths from a parasite, and hope never to see again. We used ivermectin for the first time ever (it was the new wormer at the time ~ with all the warnings not to use for more than emergency), and were extremely lucky that group wasn't mixed in with the main flock when it all happened. There isn't a single descendant of that group in the current flock.
 

spark_28

Member
Location
Western isles
Worked on a farm in Ontario that came down bad with it. Was picking up about 6 dead sheep a day until we could get the dose over to sort it. Wed check the sheep every morning and if they died after checks by the next day they would already be decomposing with the heat/ conditions . They would be very anemic or slow and sluggish

Pretty sure it was Levamisole we used and that sorted it sharp.
 

Bury the Trash

Member
Mixed Farmer
Something reminds that you have to be careful about dosing anaemic sheep with closantel?
Says nothing on the label / warnings of the drench , not sure about injectable as that acts bit differently of course.
I mean you wouldnt do really compromised ewes anyway would you as they wouldnt stick the shock.

disclaimer : im no vet
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
Says nothing on the label / warnings of the drench , not sure about injectable as that acts bit differently of course.
I mean you wouldnt do really compromised ewes anyway would you as they wouldnt stick the shock.

disclaimer : im no vet
You're right, of course. I'll have to ask the Vitnery when she comes along next if I've misremembered what was said about closantel.
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
You're right, of course. I'll have to ask the Vitnery when she comes along next if I've misremembered what was said about closantel.

No, I’ve read that too.👍

Meanwhile….
I had a visit last Friday, from a researcher from Aber Uni taking samples to investigate fluke (rumen & liver) prevalence via FEC sedimentation and blood testing. She took some poo samples from various mobs and has done the FEC testing on those samples, reporting back this afternoon.

In the sample from the crossbred ewes, alongside the high worm FEC I recorded, she found liver fluke eggs (& sent me the photo), showing adult fluke present and shedding eggs.
We’ve not fluke drenched for several years as routine coproantigen tests always come back negative, which is raising doubts as to how worthwhile that practice is too…

Plan for later in the week is to have the ewes back through to fluke drench (& probably bolus, pre-lambing jab, etc too).

There surely can’t be any other surprises in store for this year?:banghead:
 

andybk

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Mendips Somerset
No, I’ve read that too.👍

Meanwhile….
I had a visit last Friday, from a researcher from Aber Uni taking samples to investigate fluke (rumen & liver) prevalence via FEC sedimentation and blood testing. She took some poo samples from various mobs and has done the FEC testing on those samples, reporting back this afternoon.

In the sample from the crossbred ewes, alongside the high worm FEC I recorded, she found liver fluke eggs (& sent me the photo), showing adult fluke present and shedding eggs.
We’ve not fluke drenched for several years as routine coproantigen tests always come back negative, which is raising doubts as to how worthwhile that practice is too…

Plan for later in the week is to have the ewes back through to fluke drench (& probably bolus, pre-lambing jab, etc too).

There surely can’t be any other surprises in store for this year?:banghead:
do you think a lot of the problems might have been fluke related , and made worse by a hemoncus rise ? timing sounds about right, and would the zolvix "knock the fluke giving a false improvement ?
We had a bad fluke rise about 10 years ago (never seen it before ) sounds similar to your problem , hit about 10 days post lambing , ewes milk dried off , fkn nightmare ,
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
do you think a lot of the problems might have been fluke related , and made worse by a hemoncus rise ? timing sounds about right, and would the zolvix "knock the fluke giving a false improvement ?

Zolvix won’t knock fluke, it’s just a wormer. The lambs I did with Zolvix were likely a mix of worm species as they were squittering, which isn’t necessarily a haemonchus thing. That’s why I chose that product for a proper clear out drench (on roots now, so challenge removed too).

The ewes were on a separate block (since October) and fluke challenge likely quite low, just going to knock them hard on top of the high worm burden. Certainly not a big fluke problem here these days, lots of fencing, draining & water troughs put in, as well as having a drought right through the Autumn to help things on the fluke front.

My money is on a haemonchus problem, with a few fluke to add a few more kicks in.:(
Ewes are all looking sparkier since clear drench a week ago, so hopefully on the up.👍
 

ISCO

Member
Location
North East
No, I’ve read that too.👍

Meanwhile….
I had a visit last Friday, from a researcher from Aber Uni taking samples to investigate fluke (rumen & liver) prevalence via FEC sedimentation and blood testing. She took some poo samples from various mobs and has done the FEC testing on those samples, reporting back this afternoon.

In the sample from the crossbred ewes, alongside the high worm FEC I recorded, she found liver fluke eggs (& sent me the photo), showing adult fluke present and shedding eggs.
We’ve not fluke drenched for several years as routine coproantigen tests always come back negative, which is raising doubts as to how worthwhile that practice is too…

Plan for later in the week is to have the ewes back through to fluke drench (& probably bolus, pre-lambing jab, etc too).

There surely can’t be any other surprises in store for this year?:banghead:
We tested for fluke last year for the first time. Tests were negative and for the first time in probably 50 years we did not drench on vets advice.
By March we had ewes showing signs of fluke which PM confirmed. Lost a couple and a few lost condition.
We just fluke them this year.
 
Fluke tested a batch of ewes in 2018 that had been grazing some new to us SDA ground with a lot of rushes and wet bits and they came back positive(I can't remember the exact count) Dosed them and all OK. Tested them every year since and always negative and haven't dosed, so bit worried about what you say. However we're in a flock health club that has a scheme for post mortems and I think that is the best way of monitoring what is happening because they check livers, worm damage etc
 

Frank-the-Wool

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
East Sussex
Unfortunately the tests for Fluke are quite unreliable unless done every couple of weeks.
FEC will only show once they are established and may already be too late.
The Coproantigen test is the best but again having a one off test is dangerous as it will only show once the Fluke are around 10 weeks plus in the animal.
Abattoir information if available is good but again probably when too late!

Elanco have a very good site which explains all the different tests.
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
About closantel. I've asked, and what it is is tolerance of overdose is narrow in any case. It must be dosed to weight, so if a sheep is burdened by haemonchus to the point of anaemia and is then just a little bit overdosed with closantel, there's a risk of doing more harm than good.

In sheep that have haemonchus but are not as highly burdened, it's an alternative to clear drenches. All flocks are different, so to treat according to Vet's advice and history of the flock environment. There are flocks now which have flukicide resistance problems, which must also be borne in mind ~ nobody wants to lose a flukicide to anything.

(30 years ago we had that haemonchus. Dreadful parasite.)
 

neilo

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Montgomeryshire
By way of an update…

I’ve had the ewes back through to fluke drench (& pre-lamb jab and bolus) over the last few days. They were a lot sparkier running them in, with no ewes dropping in a sulk.

As one of the groups had gone the necessary time to do a FECRT, I took the opportunity while they were in. From a mob FEC of 1200 epg the clear drench has cleared them out completely (not one egg to be found👍).

I just hope the lean ones improve enough before April now, which should be possible as the leanest are only carrying singles by this stage anyway.:(

Next year Rodney, next year…
 

Jonp

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Gwent
About closantel. I've asked, and what it is is tolerance of overdose is narrow in any case. It must be dosed to weight, so if a sheep is burdened by haemonchus to the point of anaemia and is then just a little bit overdosed with closantel, there's a risk of doing more harm than good.

In sheep that have haemonchus but are not as highly burdened, it's an alternative to clear drenches. All flocks are different, so to treat according to Vet's advice and history of the flock environment. There are flocks now which have flukicide resistance problems, which must also be borne in mind ~ nobody wants to lose a flukicide to anything.

(30 years ago we had that haemonchus. Dreadful parasite.)
My daughter came to "help" fluke the ewes last year, in between the shouting I double dosed a ewe with closantel. Ewe is bright blind.
Work alone now.
 

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