Farm animal health brief overview

Vaccine

What is the most effective and cost-efficient strategy for controlling infectious disease?

Adjuvant

immunological agent that enhances immune response to a vaccine

Recombinant vaccine

vaccine that contains genetic material encoding for selected pieces of a microorganism

Adjuvants

reason for vaccine reactions with killed vaccines

attenuation

process undergone by modified live vaccines

Modified live vaccines

storage sensitive; cannot be given to pregnant animals

Autogenous vaccine

“Personalized vaccine”

3 reasons for vaccine failure

problem with vaccine, animal, administration

Problem with vaccine

improper storage or handling, expired

Problem with animal

immunosuppressed, parasitized, stressed, malnourished, incubating disease, and maternal antibody

Problem with administration

missed shots, improper location, contaminated syringes and needles

Maternal Antibodies

proteins passed from mother to offspring through colostrum

gut closure

reduction in number of mAb receptors, increased activity of digestive enzymes that breakdown mAb; begins around 24 hours after birth

Passive transfer of Immunity

delivery of immunity from the mother to the newborn

failure of transfer of immunity

failure of production, ingestion, absorption

Failure of production

parity of dam, dry period length, heat stress in late gestation, nutrition, parasite load in dam, inadequate vaccine program, low concentration or inappropriate mAb

Failure of ingestion

pain in teats, inexperienced dams, dystocia leading to fetal asphyxia, fetal injuries or malformations, low volume of colostrum ingested, longer whelping period, premature onset of lactation

Failure of absorption

gut closure, presence of gastrointestinal enzymes, chilled offspring

behavior

understanding it is critical to proper restraint and successful handling

Breed, sex, age

factors of cattle behavior

fear based behavior

number one cause of accidents and injury during handling and restraint

reducing fear

improves welfare and makes handling easier

high pitch

cattle hearing sensitive to this

Physical exam

most valuable diagnostic tool

5

best BCS for a beef cow

frick speculum

used for orogastic tube

needle for cow injections

16 ga ½ in needle (18 ga for calves)

Jugular vein

Vein used for IV injections

Coccygeal vein

used for small of amounts of blood

2 years old

2 teeth in front

3 years old

4 teeth in front

4 years old

all teeth but no wear

5 year old

all teeth with wear

anaplasmosis

anaplasma marginale (spread by ticks

Bovine Leukemia virus

causes bovine lymphosarcoma

Grass tetany

low magnesium; alert downer

exotoxins

How do clostridiums cause disease

Mastitis

udder becomes inflamed due to elevated somatic cell count

prevent and deal with mastitis

record and treat

post milking disinfection of teats

dry cow therapy

cull chronic

regular milking machine mainainence

contagious and environmental

2 major causes of mastitis

4 types of mastitis

peracute, acute, subacute, subclinical

Pasture management

most important factor of infective larvae control

key areas of pasture management

stocking density, pasture rotation, and pasture cleanliness

ostertagia

most important helminth parasite of cattle; commonly known as brown stomach worm; burrows in abomasum

free living and parasitic

ostertagia life cycle stages

horse and deer flies

most difficult external parasites to control

cattle grubs

larval stage of heel fly that damages cow hides by burrowing

cattle core vax

7 way clostridial and 5 way respitory

pregnancy toxemia

caused by excessive use of body fat for storage

endophytic fungus

grows in tall fescue and produces toxin