Tips For Nutrition And Disease Management Of Farm Animals

On any farm, disease prevention is always more preferable and cost-effective than treatment. One sick animal can mean the entire herd is at risk. Therefore, the more proactive you are about preventing disease, the less likely you face a widespread outbreak and significant financial damage. Here are ways to practice disease management with nutrition and more.

 Ensure Adequate Nutrition

Proper nutrition management is central to preventing and controlling disease among your livestock. Nutrition plays a role in how susceptible an animal is to illness, but also in managing diseases. For example, hypocalcemia (milk fever) in dairy cattle requires careful nutritional planning. Quite a few diseases that can show up in livestock are also directly related to nutritional excess, imbalance or deficiency.

Remember that the quality and source of feed can contribute to disease risks. If you are purchasing outside feed, make sure to buy from companies that have a stringent quality control process to reduce the risks of chemical or organic contamination.

Adhere to Timely Vaccination Schedules

Vaccinations are perhaps one of the most important tools you have for disease management among your cowherd or other livestock. Immunization schedules can be farm-specific, so work with your veterinarian to determine what vaccinations your livestock needs and when.

Core vaccinations can be determined by several factors, including the likelihood of animal exposure to certain illnesses and geographic location. For example, some herds may need BRSV (bovine respiratory syncytial virus), but some herds may not.

Monitor Farm Traffic and Visitors

Pathogens that cause illness can easily be brought to your farm with people or outside vehicles. You naturally want to ensure every vehicle entering your farm is free of organic materials, including your own. Some pointers to keep outside pathogens away from your livestock involve:

• Offer an easy-to-monitor entry/exit point
• Limit how many people or vehicles have access to livestock areas
• Keep non-essential visitors and vehicles outside of farm boundaries
• Maintain a daily record of all vehicles and visitors

Even people from outside the farm could bring pathogens on clothing or shoes. An easy way to prevent problems is to keep outside visitors from entering animal areas, but you can also keep a disinfectant footbath on hand or offer disposable boots for necessary visitors.

Follow Precaution When Integrating Animals

Keeping a good record of all incoming livestock is typical, as this can help track herd changes compared to new illnesses. However, beyond tracking which animals are new to the herd, a better practice is to have a protocol with all new livestock purchases.

First and foremost, only purchase animals that come along with a known health history and information about the source herd. Stick with vet recommendations about health tests that should be performed on new animals. Segregation with new animals is also important. It can be a good decision to segregate new cattle from your primary herd for 21 to 30 days.

Similar protocols should be followed when one or more of your animals leaves the farm. For example, if you have a show heifer that leaves the farm for a show, separating that heifer from the rest of the herd once home can prevent introducing illness.

Be Careful With Foreign Manure

One aspect of preventing disease that is easily overlooked is controlling manure. You don’t want manure making its way onto your farm that could contain illness-related pathogens.

Here are a few good practices for handling manure:

• Control runoff from outlying farms that could contain manure
• Avoid allowing foreign manure to enter the farm on vehicles
• Only use off-premise manure products that have been certified as pathogen-free

While manure can have its value on your farm due to nutrients for crops, livestock manure can also be a source of bacteria, protozoa and viruses that can make your livestock sick.

Disease management is not always about handling illnesses after the fact when you are more at risk or are dealing with a major problem. Taking proactive measures and implementing good preventive protocols can be a more effective approach. Examine your farm, feeding practices, and even visitors and foreign manure use to see positive changes in your herd’s health for the long term.

Editor’s Note: Dr. John L. Curtis is President and founder of Agtech, Inc. Dr. Curtis has a Ph.D. in animal science with extensive experience in all areas of cattle embryo transfer technology. He maintains active participation in daily operations of the business, including in-house research and development. Dr. Curtis also provides hands-on livestock embryo transfer training to students in the United States and internationally.