Unexplained cattle deaths

blackleg .I haven't read all replies as some seem pointless criticism but freshly turned soil will most definetly cause blackleg quite common veterinary labs didn't diagnose ours but we did on the internet!
 

le bon paysan

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Limousin, France
Has anyone ever had a conclusive answer from a post mortom? Used to send them until I realised it was a waste of time
Yes, when we were in UK we lost a cow - Blackleg, vaccinated but lost 3 more while vaccine worked. Do everything now with a clostridial , Bravoxin 10.
Had 2 dead calves wife went mental saying they hadn't sucked (my fault then) - there guts were not joined up, as they were full of milk at PM but it could not pass through.
Nearly everything dead gets PM here, can't work out how many lives it has saved.
 

bert

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
n.yorks
The French have some sort of awards. Golden hoof I think it is. A guy (who didn't win!) had 100% calves to cows. Wife was reading it as I can't, yea yea, I say, probably got 3 cows. Nope. 230 calves from 230 cows:eek:. I can only dream of such results but we do improve each year:)
I only dream of these results too, but could lost 2 or 3 and had a few twins to make numbers up
 

Henarar

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Somerset
Well done, how many you calving? We always seem to get a few losses along the lines somewhere
We keep around 45 cows, I said we have done it, we don't do that every year by any stretch of the imagination, in the last year we have had one cow calve a few weeks early with a dead calf and we lost an Angus calf out of a heifer at calving
I do aim to calve 100% alive and cuss myself if I lose one, I don't mind staying home or staying up all night to try to do that, when you only have a smallish number to make the money from one loss is a bigger loss percentage wise
 
Losses don't include wrong in the bag ewes killed and empty cows killed. Lambing ewe lambs would have 10 per cent ish empty, would never lose those. Would lose a few lambs between coming down and lambing, probably 12 during or straight after lambing. Shawn in autumn and may so little trouble on backs, no twin lamb with ewe lambs, fluke cows as they come in and sheep once pre lambing, don't have a major issue. Lamb losses on the ewe lambs would depend on the scanning, if awfully high like 150 per cent for ewe lambs, I want 105, it would be quite a few hundred, anything small is gone, many twins left out overnight are singles by morning, maybe not ethically right but the lambs/ theaves will fall by the wayside if too many twins. Funnily enough I use far from easy calving bulls, but I guess I have 210/215 to calve a year and would only miss about 10 births, and that's only down to misjudgement, had easiest calving year last year for some unknown reason, same cows, bulls, feeding. Keep cows lean pre calving, which is not everyones cup of tea but suits my cows, enduce anything that has been bagged up for three days, sometimes two and the bones, or ligaments are not altering on the back end, the ones that hang on are the problem ones. The other year had rotovirus, think 5 years ago, huge expense and must have lost 20/25. Not always great, but when you have a good year can you not say? Lost one cow in who; year until this week, now 2 more!!
 

bert

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
n.yorks
We keep around 45 cows, I said we have done it, we don't do that every year by any stretch of the imagination, in the last year we have had one cow calve a few weeks early with a dead calf and we lost an Angus calf out of a heifer at calving
I do aim to calve 100% alive and cuss myself if I lose one, I don't mind staying home or staying up all night to try to do that, when you only have a smallish number to make the money from one loss is a bigger loss percentage wise
We lost more than i was happy with last calving, due to a bad calving bull, didn't lose a single calf off the other 2 bulls, culled the afending bull before we had finished calving. Bloody thing. Hopefully the replacement bull will be more successful, will find out in a few weeks when we start
 

Devonian

Member
Spoke to a farmer today that had two cows to die unexpectedly and one store heifer.
All well minerals etc available only thing different was they were on new reseeds?
Clostridia or would it be grass staggers?
@GTB
We lost two sucklers suddenly in two days 12 months ago now. We're fine in morning dead in afternoon. Was devastating!! Had post mortems done and vets reckon it was magnesium deficiency. I always thought it was a spring thing, but apparently not. Mag blocks in front of them always now.
 

Sethieboy

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Pembrokeshire
In both cases of milk fever this year it was when the mag buckets had run out. Luckily both cows recovered but we're extra careful that they don't run out now. I assume there must be some calcium in them too?
Which mag buckets do you use? Have you got any experience of using mag flakes in the water?
 

Sethieboy

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Pembrokeshire
Which mag buckets do you use? Have you got any experience of using mag flakes in the water?
Crystalyx high mag buckets. Never tried mag flakes. Wouldn't be practical here as we have streams in a lot of fields.
ah same here then, good palatable licks they are, not the cheapest but they work well, thinking of trying the flakes to try and save some cash
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


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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