NeilOughton1:

Jacobus, according to a Dutch friend of mine that is in the thick of it, you really don't want it when the ewes are in lamb. Most of them won't be by the end of it! At least if they get it near weaning, you might manage to sell a few next year.

Neil, whilst I appreciate it isn't a good time to ask your Dutch friend about this, but could he/she give us any indication of how the ewes were treated ie did they use Pen/Strep or was tetracycline better.  I know we will only be trying to suppress secondary infection at best but any specific tips on decreasing mortality might help, rather than us all having to reinvent the wheel again.

the aged clun, I copy the following from his last email......

Neil,

Many thanks for that.  Stunned silence must be an understatement!

What I find really incredible - apart from the obvious lack of urgency on the vaccine front - is that this has been going on in our near neighbours for eighteen months without most farmers here being remotely aware of the devastation it can cause or apparently how little can be done in truly practical terms to help suffering stock. 

Isabel, if you're reading this, tell your editor that you need a cross channel break, get the stories at the heart of the diseased area and let's get as much pubicity out there as possible.  Farmers need to know the truth to jerk them out of ignorance and the public and politicians need to know the truth to jerk them fram apathy.

Frank

I am totally behind you on this one, if you need anything signed (petitions or anything) please let me know. I know we don't have anywhere near the amount of sheep you do, but it affects us all no matter how many we have. I am sure we have all had BT be it a mild case in the last weeks as well, unexplained deaths that make you scratch your head. Good luck with blood testing today, be interested to hear about the cattle as we have some not very far away from you !! Don't know what my Dad would have been saying about all this if he was still here, enough to make him pack up I would have thought.

Absolutely! This is potentially worse than FMD, but has already gone from news headlines.

neil

we are also stunned..  but will not be silent

what breed were these sheep please?

Isabel,      I am concerned that if this all BT info still on the fmd thread then it is being missed by those searching for more BT info, is there anyway please you can duplicate/rectify this?

many thanks

All

I have already started a new thread BLUETONGUE NOW ENDEMIC!

Regards

Frank

Good luck to you all down in Kent, I was born there and feel close to you all.

I now live in Derbyshire and feel its only a matter of time before we get it here.

We really do need to get this on the telly more. People havent a clue as we didnt until a few weeks ago. How can all this be happening just over the water while our government and defra have been sitting here doing nothing. I read that the midge eggs are carried in horse dung which makes horses carriers in my book therefore they should be on a standstill within their areas too but i guess that may upset the wrong people.

It really isnt good enough and WE must do something because no one else will.

Sorry to hear the news, Frank, but thanks for posting. This is really helpful information.

It appears that the symptoms of BT are not easily recognised. Ewes may be "off colour" for a couple of days and then recover whereas lambs may die without showing any of the obvious signs. The symptoms of diseases like Orf in some ways are similar to BT. Livestock farmers do not call out the Vet every time an animal is sick you do the best you can for it and hope it gets better. BT is a notifiable disease but if the symptoms are not that clear how do we know if we have the diiease. To be on the safe side you should call Defra every time you think you may have a problem even it it turns out not to be BT. However given that it may well be that the desease is more widespread than the official records show, could Defra really cope if every one called them for every suspect case of BT? I suspect not. 

If god forbid I did get BT in my flock and I notify Defra what are they going to do? It would appear the answer is nothing other than just record it in their notebooks. So that raises the question why call Defra in the first place? Yes I know because I am suppose to but I am sure a lot of farmers are just not going to contact Defra. There is no incentive and in fact there is a real disincentive if you have to get all your sheep in and penned up just so that a man from Defra can inspect them. Then there is the question of what do you do with any dead animals. If Defra know you have BT on your farm there may well be some losses and they would expect your records to show that they have been collected through the fallen livestock scheme. As Frank says the financial loss of the animal is more than enough to bear but to then have to pay for that animal to be taken away. I am sure that as a result of BT there will be many lambs that die that will be "taken by the foxes" or a few ewes that die will just dissappear overnight.  The incentive to notify Defra must surely be that in return for letting them know you have BT that there is a free collection service for dead animals. 

Shropshire lad,

I totally agree with your last point - if there is no incentive to report the symptoms there will be a lot of people who don't bother.  DEFRA are putting extra money into NFSCo to give free collection in the FMD zone - presumably on the basis that there may be a lot of animals culled by farmers unable to move them to winter grazing.  It should be an easy matter to notify RPA of the NFS membership numbers of all holdings with Bluetongue confirmed.

As you say there does seem to be a great variety of symptoms being presented, with not a lot of commonality.  In fact, from what I have read, the only common factor seems to be the sort of flu-like fever and the appearance of an animal which is under the weather.  This year we have had lambs with orf, and we have had lambs with photo-sensitisation.  We have had both diseases on the farm before, and I am confident of my diagnosis (although with the latter, if it had happened after BTV was reported in the country I would have been less confident, but with the swelling visibly reduced after 24 hours out of the sun and gone in a few days I think it was pretty well indicative).  In neither case was there any sign that the lambs felt really unwell eg. no lack of appetite, no listlessness etc.. 

So at my present level of knowledge, it would seem that if an animal's behaviour doesn't give the appearance of its being unwell, I wouldn't be concerned enough to call Animal Health.  But am I right?  I don't know - but I do know that I feel that I do not have enough information.  It's one thing to read the relevant publications and look at the illustrations, but it seems that most of these illustrate the most extreme of the symptoms.  Would it be useful for a video of the range of symptoms and their severity to be available to download from DEFRA?

As Shropshire lad says, it is very much in DEFRA's interest to minimise the number of false alarm cases reported.

The deputy chief vet is giving an update on the bluetongue situation this afternoon. We'll keep you posted with any developments.

From DEFRA: 

Changes to export rules have been agreed in Brussels today which will allow meat and meat products to be exported from more areas of England to other EU Member States. Rules for exporting meat and meat products have also been eased. 

This follows the previous Commission decision which came into effect on 12 October allowing trade of meat from some parts of the country. Today’s decision means that trade will be able to  take place from most of England, subject to strict conditions. We expect these new rules to come into effect next week. 
Deputy Chief Vet, Fred Landeg, said:

“This is a welcome decision from the Commission and other Member States. It demonstrates the confidence they have in the measures we are taking to eradicate FMD through our ongoing extensive surveillance and epidemiological work.”

We will be publishing detailed guidance on what this means for exporters shortly, and the conditions that will apply.

It remains vital that all involved in the supply chain adhere strictly to the requirements of any licence which allows this trade to take place safely  and maintain the confidence of our trading partners. It is only through the co-operation of all that we will be able to keep up the good progress we have made so far towards easing FMD restrictions where the risk indicates it is safe to do so.

These changes do not affect national domestic controls relating to FMD and Bluetongue on movements of live animals within Great Britain. 

On Bluetongue, the Control Zone in Kent is being extended into East Sussex following confirmation today of a case near Rye.  The Bluetongue Protection Zone is also being slightly amended accordingly. This reflects the UK’s Bluetongue Control Strategy and EU legislation.

Currently, there remains eight Foot and Mouth disease infected premises. On Bluetongue, there were 45  infected premises at 5pm on 18 October .

Neil,

Thank you for your most helpful posting on symptoms.

All the best to Frank  - this is becoming a nightmare!

Isabel, I see you have removed the headline about Welsh slaughterhouses being open for English lambs. I believe that no decision is going to be taken until  Tuesday. On an earlier post I said that I was 100 miles from the nearest outbreak actually after checking it is 150 miles.  Nobody as yet has explained the science behind the fact that animals can move from near the outbreak to me or my neighbours, yet I am unable to send stock for slaughter into Wales or even move stock a few hundred yards to my welsh land. If the outbreak moved a bit closer to me, even say 80 miles away, then I would be able to move stock into wales because it would be in the zone. I would still be grateful for any comments about the way the outbreak is being handled even if it is to tell me why I am wrong in my belief  that it is a total farce.

Thankfully we do not have bluetongue, well not yet anyway. However, I'm sure we will get it soon and while I'm not sure if we've already seen it this summer I'm not convinced we haven't either.

Now we have a bigger problem though, none of our usual ram customers have the confidence to buy any tups and we're stuck with shearling rams with no where to go. Feeding them another year is pointless  - we'll simply double the number on the market next year and cripple two year's trade not one. The way DEFRA have drawn the control zone lines is a joke and someone somewhere has to realise that now is the time to make the UK one control zone.

For those of you wanting more bluetongue information watch this space, we are partnering NSA, NBA and LAA in a series of meetings in November. Initially these will be in the south and east of the country, but are likely to run across the country in due course. Each meeting will feature at least one European speaker to explain how the disease has been handled on the Continent and what we can expect here.

 I'll post more details as we finalise them.

 Jonathan Long, FW Livestock Editor

Jonathan, I don't know whether to feel happy that you don't have BT or desperately sorry concerning your ram situation. It's bad enough with this year's stock but to put 18 months' effort into an animal to see it all thwarted by blue lines, DEFRA and a disease that should (in my purely personal opinion) have been foreseen by the authorities, is devastating.

It is very alarming that you mention that none of your usual customers have the confidence to buy stock. I suppose, if I think about it, the question does cross my mind "is it worth doing this or investing in that if half the stock is decimated at some point in the next year?" I guess the only way to look at it is that at least I will have the other half (I hope).

Will look out for the meetings. Thank you FW for helping to organise them.

I agree with the aged clun at times like this its hard to know what to say. I can certainly sympathise with you about your rams as although we don't breed rams to sell as what ones we have we tend to keep as replacements but we have got some stores and some ewe lambs we were going to sell but not even if they do open the country up as one CZ you can't help but wonder if anyone would wabt to buy lambs from this area.

We had planned on buying several more rams and trying some different terminal breeds but then with the prices we have been getting we just couldn't justifying buying any more than the 3 we brought. I guess I should try and listen to my dad when he says it pointless worrying, what happens happens, you just have to try and muddle on as normally as possible. Even so I still can't help but worry.

I did try and think of other animals that are not susceptible to fmd or bt. At first I thought of ostrichies but then I thought of bird flu, but now I have finally thought of one that I don't think is and that kangaroos although I think we would need better fences!

I hope that you do get some buyers for your rams soon and I will keep a look out for your meetings. Also I like the jacket as well as a good bit of advertising of the FW

I agree with the aged clun at times like this its hard to know what to say. I can certainly sympathise with you about your rams as although we don't breed rams to sell as what ones we have we tend to keep as replacements but we have got some stores and some ewe lambs we were going to sell but not even if they do open the country up as one CZ you can't help but wonder if anyone would wabt to buy lambs from this area.

We had planned on buying several more rams and trying some different terminal breeds but then with the prices we have been getting we just couldn't justifying buying any more than the 3 we brought. I guess I should try and listen to my dad when he says it pointless worrying, what happens happens, you just have to try and muddle on as normally as possible. Even so I still can't help but worry.

I did try and think of other animals that are not susceptible to fmd or bt. At first I thought of ostrichies but then I thought of bird flu, but now I have finally thought of one that I don't think is and that kangaroos although I think we would need better fences!

I hope that you do get some buyers for your rams soon and I will keep a look out for your meetings. Also I like the jacket as well as a good bit of advertising of the FW ,

I agree with the aged clun at times like this its hard to know what to say. I can certainly sympathise with you about your rams as although we don't breed rams to sell as what ones we have we tend to keep as replacements but we have got some stores and some ewe lambs we were going to sell but not even if they do open the country up as one CZ you can't help but wonder if anyone would wabt to buy lambs from this area.

We had planned on buying several more rams and trying some different terminal breeds but then with the prices we have been getting we just couldn't justifying buying any more than the 3 we brought. I guess I should try and listen to my dad when he says it pointless worrying, what happens happens, you just have to try and muddle on as normally as possible. Even so I still can't help but worry.

I did try and think of other animals that are not susceptible to fmd or bt. At first I thought of ostrichies but then I thought of bird flu, but now I have finally thought of one that I don't think is and that kangaroos although I think we would need better fences!

I hope that you do get some buyers for your rams soon and I will keep a look out for your meetings. Also I like the jacket as well as a good bit of advertising of the FW, although I would have thought that they would have put Farmers Weekly and local farmer

If as in FMD deer can contract BTV, it would seem any efforts by DE(A)FRA to restrict livestock movements are even more futile. If infected deer are roaming free re infecting midges further on, what is the point of restricting livestock movements?

sjk:

I did try and think of other animals that are not susceptible to fmd or bt

Well we have always had about 60 - 70 horses, not kept like horsey people keep, but run much like suckler cows, and yarded with cattle in winter, we sell the youngstock off to local people to break, they aren't handled until the day they leave us when we put a headcollar on them and off they go. Been very grateful to them in these current troubled times as at least it has been an income, and luckily sold most of the foals off at weaning so not too many to winter. Not sure too many other farmers would want this though knowing how unpopular horses are with many of you !!!

I have just read Frank's very honest diary on the "Bluetongue Diary" thread. His problems make difficult reading and one can only sympathise and count one's blessings. The only heartening point was that sheep showing signs of the disease have seemingly recovered. Could there be some differences between the breeds we have here and those on the continent? Neil's Dutch friend had severe symptoms in his sheep, but even so there may have been differences. He mentions losing 10% of "flock ewes" but 40% of "pedigree ewes" Could the flock ewes be crossbred sheep?. I realise the differences might be accounted for by the two groups being in separate places and exposed to differing concentrations of midges. They might also be explained by the fact that the pedigree sheep could be fewer in number. Obviously, 4 out of 10 sheep = 40% but 10 out of 100 sheep = only 10% and a larger number of sheep have been affected in the latter case. Similarly, with the rams - there are generally fewer rams on a farm than ewes so even a few dying could produce a larger percentage.

I know this sounds like clutching at straws but if particular groups of sheep are more susceptible, either because of gender, age or breeding, it may help to target preventative measures at those groups.

I am still rather confused by the insecticide preventative treatment. The info I have on Flypor and Spot On (deltamethrin?) and Crovect (cypermethrin) seem to indicate that treatment for headfly is once every 4 weeks. Postings on FW imply that preventative treatment for BT might have to be more often. Surely that could be toxic? Does anyone know exactly how much of this stuff we are supposed to be using and where to apply it in this instance? It might be expensive but could be worth it on the rams and valuable ewes at least.