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Calves are baby cows or bulls that need special care and nutrition to ensure they grow up to be productive members of a cattle herd. Many calves need to be hand-raised depending on the circumstances and the health conditions that exist on the farm already.
The prevention of disease and the spread of disease within a herd is the reason why so many cattle farmers and livestock farmers raising any type of barn yard animal put into place a biosecurity plan.
What is a Biosecurity Plan?
Even if you are not a commercial livestock farmer, having a biosecurity plan is important for the health of your herd and the health of other livestock living around your farm. Work with your local ag extension agency to develop a plan that is scaled to the size of your farm or livestock operation to protect animals from the spread of contagious disease among livestock.
Common Calf Health Issues
Many calves are able to grow up without much intervention from their human owners, however knowing how to care for a sick baby calf is vital to not only protecting the individual calf but is also important to protecting the entire herd. Here are two of the most common health issues that arise in calves: Scours and Respiratory Disease.
Scours
Scours is one of the most common health problems among calves less than one month old. Scours can be caused by an infection or by improper nutrition and causes severe dehydration and death. Early identification of scours is important to successful treatment of scours.
Nutritional Scours
Nutritional scours can be caused by any one or combination of the following:
Before turning to antibiotics to treat calf scours, look at the calf's possible nutritional deficiencies and other nutritional factors that could be causing the scours. Using antibiotics can kill harmful bacteria, but antibiotics also kills some beneficial bacteria in calves, so the use of antibiotics should be limited to those times when you have eliminated all other possible causes. Contact a veterinarian to get more information about how to treat your calves if scours develops.
Nutritional scours is easily prevented by maintaining a consistent and well-balanced feeding plan for your calves. Here are some tips for preventing nutritional scours in your calves:
Infectious Scours
Infectious scours is caused by bacteria, viruses and protozoa that are common to a livestock farm environment. Many adult cattle carry these pathogens; however the immune system of an adult animal is strong enough to prevent illness. Calves, on the other hand, do not have a well-established immune system and are susceptible to becoming very ill when exposed to these organisms. Follow these tips to help prevent infectious scours in your calves:
How to Treat Scours in Calves
Calves with scours should be monitored daily. Since dehydration is the primary cause of death among calves with scours, the first step in treating scours is to reverse the loss of fluids and electrolytes. Continue feeding milk replacer twice daily in addition to an electrolyte formula between feedings. Wait 2-3 hours after feeding milk replacer until feeding electrolytes. Do not mix electrolytes in with milk replacers. If the scours persists after a few days, contact your veterinarian.
Scour Scoring
A scour score is ranked on a scale of 1 to 4 and helps livestock owners monitor the calf's fecal consistency. Scour score rankings are as follows:
If a calf has a scour score of 4, you should feed the calf an electrolyte solution immediately to reverse the loss of fluids and restore electrolyte balance. Then contact your veterinarian to get a proper analysis of what type of scours it is: nutritional or infectious. The type of scours will determine whether feeding habits need to be changed or whether antibiotics should be given.
Respiratory Disease in Calves
Respiratory disease in cattle and calves is very common. Bacterial or viral pneumonia is accompanied by many of the symptoms we associate with human pneumonia: coughing, runny nose and labored breathing / wheezing. Respiratory disease in calves can be prevented by the following:
Early detection and treatment of illness in calves is the most effective way to eliminate both scours and respiratory disease. Contact your veterinarian as soon as possible if you think your calf or calves have developed either condition.