The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Sheep => Topic started by: kanisha on July 10, 2015, 07:28:41 pm
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The sheep were shorn and wormed two days ago. i used ivomec injectable. Two days later one of them has a harsh almost retch like cough . Not all the time just ocasionally. Usually i would be thinking it would be a good idea to worm in case of lung worm, so why would he start coughing now?
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Animals with lungworm usually cough after dosing. All the dead worms in the airways cause a massive inflamatory response. If they have a very heavy burden its not uncommon for them to die from dead worms blocking the airways.. Lungworm in sheep seems to be on the increase, seeing a lot more cases this year.
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thank you although not good news for me :-( It does sound as if that is the case the cough is raspy as if there is inflammation rather than a soft cough. They are better today than yesterday so hopefully things are improving. is there a specific regime that would be better to combat the problem. I generally worm spring and autumn but was late with some of them this year.
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I can't say I have ever seen that Farmvet - do you really see sheep die of lungworm commonly? Where are you practising? Are those dead sheep also poor for other reasons? In this area at least it never seems to amount to much in sheep.
Sheep say: "A-he...A-he...A-he" Cattle obviously are a different story!
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Hi Me. its a new one on me too but since Christmas I've had 4 different flocks with lungworm deaths, usually after worming. Some I've opened up others went to lab. In each case the airways are filled with worms which the lab identified as dictyocaulus spp. Up till now I've always just thought of sheep having a bit of mullerous (spelling!) causing mild or no signs and gritty bits in the lungs on pm. Generally I recommend worming ewes just around lambing but in flocks with confirmed lungworm needing to rethink this a bit. I'm in Perthshire.
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Veeeeery interesting :thinking:
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Interesting for me to , for the last 3-4yrs iv'e had lungworm in my x ewes that iv'e had to treat feb / mar , can't say any have died after worming , but cases of pneumonia increase and yes some keep coughing for a week or two . I try to follow best practise but since I stopped dosing the fit ewes pre tupping the problem has increased in these , the lean ewes are wormed pre tupping and they don't seem to have a problem . Does this make sense ?? ( talked to my vet )
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My mature ewes get one or no wormers in a year. This year they haven't had one (first timers have at lambing). I wouldn't rush to worm at the first "A-he... A-he... A-he" (sorry, its my favourite sheep impression) but I will bear your dead sheep in mind farmvet
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Sorry, newbie question, will the normal drenches work for lungworms, or does it have to be injectable? I'm assuming drenches only cover gut worms? Thanks
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Look the wormer up on NOAH. Some of them do kill lungworm. You don't get a long period of cover though, only 3 weeks our vet told us, but the year we had a problem, we found that just giving the lambs a break helped them a lot. We'd only known about it because lungworm was reported in half of a batch of lambs we sent deadweight.