The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: Tracy mayoh on July 20, 2017, 07:51:27 am
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I had a delivery of four wethered ryeland last night
They all received a foot vax on entering their new land space
They all seemed ok when arriving and entering new field
About an hour later I noticed one had a slight limp put a little pressure on leg when walking etc still follows other round
Still slight limp this morning seems to ease a little after walking round seems worse when been led down and first gets up
Could this be caused due to tenderness from foot vax jab in shoulder or by being transported and handled whilst farmer battled with them to get them out trailer???
Any help appreciated
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Could this be caused due to tenderness from foot vax jab in shoulder or by being transported and handled whilst farmer battled with them to get them out trailer???
Any help appreciated
Yes & Yes give it time to see what happens
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Four out of 28 of mine went lame for a couple of days after giving footvax. Nearly half of them have swollen necks from the injections too.
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When I Footvax'd in 2007 several of my young sheep got nasty lumps on the injection site and I had to catch them every few days to treat the wounds where they'd rubbed against tree trunks to try and alleviate the irritation. A few of those also limped. The adjuvant is quite thick and oily. If I was doing it again I'd wait until late Autumn so at least I'd not have the fly problem, but I haven't seen footrot or scald since.
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MF do you do repeat Vaccinations or just the one off?
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Backinwellies - I can't speak for MF, but we footvaxed our flock the winter before last, because we had a real problem with our sheep developing cracked hooves, which meant they then easily became infected with just about anything going.
To get control of the situation, we reluctantly footvaxed all of them (two jabs a few weeks apart). The jab was easy enough, but yes, there were a few pussy lumps which passed in time. I would agree with MF that this is best done outside flystrike season.
Since then, the incidence of scald in the lambs has decreased markedly (none at all last year, and only a couple of minor cases this year). We saw one incidence of footrot in a vaccinated ewe a couple of months ago, but it cleared up with alamycin very quickly. She is on her final warning, since I'm worried she could be a reservoir of infection which might then go on to affect others.
As mentioned elsewhere, we put out zinc rockies licks, which I believe have improved the strength of hooves. So this, coupled with a single course of footvax has given us the control we needed over the situation. We now seldom have to do anything with feet, whereas previously we were footbathing with goldenhoof+ every couple of weeks. If incidences of footrot started to recur in future, I would give them all a booster. However, this hasn't been necessary to date.
HTH!