Despite their value, the costs of maintaining a dog team are often a source of grief when annual accounts are reviewed. The expense of orthopaedic surgery can often provoke protest but it’s the outcomes that bring most bother. Unfortunately this type of surgery comes with no guarantees, just as in humans.
Dog vaccinations are another frequent target for accusations of rip-offs. Being associated with both sides of the fence, I can only advise dialogue between parties. Also, I think dog insurance is an underused protection from the ravages of expensive dog repairs.
I had an interesting experience recently with sheep I graze on a neighbouring property. They were mixed-age ewes in very good condition and running with the ram. However, a couple had died with one still intact so that an autopsy could be carried out. It was a classical Salmonellosis. A yarding for vaccination was on the agenda for the next day.
However, tempered by the yards and shed not fitting all the ewes and a mid-morning appointment only about half of them could be vaccinated.
Getting the remaining ewes in the next morning I became frustrated that many were slow and not keeping in the mob. Once vaccinating got under way I noticed several had swelling under their jaws and also very white mucous membranes. This was classical Haemonchus, not surprising for a property that had had only sheep for the past 20 years and had been very dry for a long time before Cyclone Pam’s rain. I cursed my oversight in not noticing it the day before in the first mob.
A trip to get some drench was the next move and the mob was vaccinated and drenched. Getting the previous day’s mob back in again to drench I noted just how vigorous they were, really displaying their Perendale roots. Once under way with the drenching I could not see a single one with under-the-jaw swelling. In fact they battled me the whole way. I was consoled I had not missed the tell-tale signs the day before.
It was not possible the symptoms of Haemonchus infestation had developed over 24 hours because the ewes were in a particular paddock they’d shared with the rest of the mob. I can only presume when I let half the mob through that the anaemic ones did not make the cut. With this part-time farming it took until the next weekend to assess the outcome and no further deaths occurred.
From an in-the-paddock viewing the swelling had gone and they all moved through to their next break very fast. I think I may have dodged a bullet with the Salmonella deaths being the prompt for a closer look. Being mixed-age ewes their chance of dying from Haemonchus would not have been high but they would have been looking very sad left untreated.
The summer dry
The unusually dry summers are altering the pattern of disease and certainly putting pressure on winter. It is interesting how the unusually dry summer-autumn in many places is becoming a regular feature, enough to consider changes to the policy. But this year in particular the dry conspired with the lamb market to clog autumn.
Because the store lamb price dropped along with the availability of quality feed, decisions around feeding priorities became very difficult to make. Ewes have suffered on many farms and in particular two-tooth ewes. This will obviously affect next year’s production but the hidden cost is the risk of not taking enough pasture into winter.
Body condition and pasture cover being taken into winter is the most effective barrier against unkind winters and springs. Even in good seasons there is never more condition or cover coming out of winter than went in.
- Trevor Cook is a Manawatu veterinarian.
