There is a live vaccine which comes in a neat little applicator bottle with a couple of sharp blades which nick the skin as you apply a drop of vaccine.  A scab forms at the site, but because the vaccine is live, the scab is infectious, so you have to be very careful when and where you vaccinate.  Experiments on the virus in Edinburgh have shown that it is almost impossible to kill in the environment, being well able to survive exposure to Scottish winters.

The only saving grace is that it is only spread through direct contact with a cut or skin abrasion - so if lambs get it, the ewes' teats will also be infected.  If sheep with scabs on their mouths are feeding from a trough or bucket, scabs will drop off and be picked up by another sheep.  This only matters if they have some skin damage to the mouth - hence our problem with our prickly field.

Being a virus, there is no cure, just antibiotics to guard against secondary infection, and wait for the natural antibodies to build up and defeat it - about 4 to 5 weeks.  The pics on the FWi page are fairly extreme - we have never had anything as bad as that.  Just a few scabs round the mouth and maybe on the top of the head if ram lambs have been fighting.  We find that in our bad field, normally grazing meat lambs, if one gets it, maybe 30% will, but as it seems to only be quite a mild strain, the ones affected will have had a little set back, but it's all over in a few weeks.

They say you learn something every day and today i have learnt about orf

Thank you i feel like i have a better understanding than when i went to college

Is this likely to spread far or can it be restricted to prevent further cases if it is orf at this farm in east sussex?

What are they affects to the food chain with this ? can livestock infected go in to the food chain or do they have to be kept or shot.

I can understand what you mean with the live vaccination as when i was at school many a year ago i had to have a menigites injection as someone at the school died, they in the months after another 4 people ended up becoming ill with meningitis beign different strains due to the live vaccination.

Maybe more farms need to be more careful with bio security from now on as there just seem to be more and  more viruses and diseases affecting our stock and britian feeding itself.

It can only spread from sheep to sheep really through the infected scabs dropping off and being picked up.  Obviously an infected sheep brought onto a farm can bring the disease but normal isolation of bought in stock should reveal it before passing on.  Also second hand troughs, hay racks etc from farm sales should always be thoroughly disinfected before use.  Most times of the year it is nothing more than an inconvenience, but at lambing can be real trouble as ewes try to kick off lambs etc.. then hungry lamb tries to steal from another ewe and passes it on.  At this time it is much better to vaccinate unaffected sheep and isolate infected ones.

Despite orf being quite common, most of the suspect cases of FMD which have turned out not to be are probably orf.  I'm not sure why it should get confused, because it is quite distinctive and not at all like FMD (not that I've seen that - only pictures!).  

What a fuss about a very common problem in sheep !! It is very easy to treat,forget all this vaccination, disinfecting troughs etc. (nice to have the time when you lamb 2000 ewes !). Both my husband & I have been farming for over 50 years & orf would be one of the least problematical things to treat. We always have rock salt in the fields with sheep in. If we have any sheep with lesions we simply rub ordinary salt into the lesion & within 2 hours it dries up & begins to heal, In two to three days the lesions are completely dried up & healed.

On the confusion with FMD issue, in the 2001 outbreak down here in Devon there were many problems with misdiagnosis (especially from the Spanish vets who were brought here to cope with the overwhelming load of testing that had to be done) as many of these young vets had not seen orf in their own countries.

We do sypmathise with you chaps in the South East, but at least you have not had it on the massive scale we had it down here in 2001. We counted 19 pyres burning within a radius of 20 miles of our top farm one evening at lambing time. To this day the sight of an innocent bonfire or a bulk lorry covered in tarpaulin turns my blood to ice. 

 

exmoor

jacobus was mearly explaining to me what orf was as i ahd never heard of it or seen it before and was just answering my question so that i could get a better understanding about the virus.

he did state that the vaccine was more hassle than its worth.

but he did kindly help me to understand the virus and where it comes from etc.

Your points are valid and i will remember that about the salt as you say this helps to get rid of the scabs sooner rather than later and will inform anyone in which enquires.

cheers

Its another false alarm thank goodness, so lets hope nothing stops markets getting going Friday in Ashford and see if we can get back to some sort of normality, except for prices of course !!!!!!!!!!

On the subject of orf, i do believe you can get mineral licks which assist in the healing of lesions.

 

interesting, which minerals help in healing the lesions?

 

Ah yes heatherp, Ashford on Friday, my feeling is any sort of a trade is better than no trade and I'm far from optimistic about prices, will anyone want breeding sheep this autumn, or has the threat of bluetongue put everyone off completely?

Phew.... Thank God for that!!!! False Alarm for FMD!!!!

Been watching from a distance.. . . . .....Know what it's like!!  I KNOW I was a FIREWALL for FMD spreading!! (my "girls" were all neg.twice..) I soooo miss my "girls".... So much.... So quiet....Moving on now ......

Salt licks are probably the same sort that we used to give to the horses. Never thought to give them to my sheep. Will give it a go in the spring. Or before as DEFRA say I can re-stock sooner But I'de better check! What one says another contradicts. I don't know where I am 2 B honest!! Check with who though? It can all be so frustrating!

As to the minerals.......to be honest ....I really don't know. But I bet Google will! L.O.L. Gd Luck.(I'm sure we had mineral licks for the cattle 2 though..!.)

(p.s. for those not  comp. lit. L.O.L. means Laugh out loud (or it can mean Lots of Love. Depends on the context)

I WILL TOP UP. A.S.A.P

thanks for reply I'll google it

http://www.apd.rdg.ac.uk/AgEcon/livestockdisease/sheep/orf.htm this article is interesting

What a sad reflection on modern sheep management when you have to Google to find out how to treat something so basic as orf. As I said earlier ROCK salt licks not any old mineral lick. Mineral licks are manufactured to be species specific. So if unsure ask your feed merchant as some minerals fed to sheep in the incorrect balance e.g. copper can actually be poisonous.