[dyedinthewool]

Hi,
 
A bit of information please.  I bought a ram lamb at local mart in late Sept to cover my 'vast' flock of three ewes.  He was sold as a store but was in the ram section.
 
He did his job and none returned, unfortunately I couldn't keep him as not enough acreage to keep a ram and ewes and lambs plus I have four ewe lambs from this year I am breeding from next year, so I put him back into the mart (Tue) yesterday I had a call from the mart to say he had been rejected by the abattoir because he had wasn't sure of what the guy said - it's something to do with picking up worms from dog faeces.  I said i don't have any dogs neither do any of my neighbours, we've not had any hounds across (local gun pack sometimes shoot on neighbours land and the hounds have been known to cross the top paddock).
 
What was he on about? and will he have passed it on to my girls.
 
And on a secondary note can I claim my money back from the guy the ram came from or do I count it as 'beware' and don't buy anything from a mart in future.....

[Blinkers]

He's talking about a Gid cyst.....which is picked up by sheep eating grass that has had unwormed dogs s****ing on it, basically, and the gid works its way to the brain and starts eating that too.....that's in a nutshell really.  There's lots of info if you look up Gid Cyst but as to where you stand, I'm not sure.   What have they done with the carcase?   Gone to knacker yard presumably.   
Mx

[dyedinthewool]

Hi Blinkers,
 
Hope you are all okay up there.
 
Waiting for the mart guy to get back to me with more info.
 
He did say 'some' farmers don't always keep up to date with worming their dogs so it could be 'poor' hygiene on the farm issue.  He was going to see from the 'ear tag' info who the ram came from.
 
Now I know what it's called I'l have a google - he must have abreviated it as it didn't sound like that.  I don't always understand the Welsh acccent...

[Blinkers]

Hiya D 
 
I guess if the ram came from one of the mountain flocks then there's not a lot they can do other than keep their fingers crossed that dog owners keep their dogs tapeworm wormed.     A few years ago, the vet diagnosed a gid in my Ram Hywel (there is a post on here somewhere).  However, fortunately the vet was wrong and Hywel had suffered a minor TIA (stroke) which left him blind in his left eye and a bit of a problem cudding on that side.    Having said that, he's still with me, still covers a few ewes each year, is still a devil at tupping time, and is still an absolute 'love' the rest of the time.     Sadly, your chap has been opened up and the evidence has been exposed, but it would be good for you to know who the breeder/flock owner was, so that maybe you can avoid a further purchase from that particular flock.   
We;re fine here.....now !!!!    Waterfalls coming off the fields last week and one of the goat sheds flooded when the drainage ditch was breached, but all OK now and everyone back in their respective pens....phew.     Glorious last few days though, thank goodness.   How's the pork?  .

[Canadian Sheepfarmer]

Over here we call it sheep measels. The carcase has white rings in the meat, a bit like measels in people. It cannot be sold as it looks wrong.
 
By bad hygene I presume he means that dogs, or other canines have been feeding on sheep carcases left unburied or uncomposted. The parasite travels from sheep to dogs. Dogs to sheep.
 
It is an increasing problem here in Canada as so many of us now have big white dogs, Great Pyrenees, Marremas, Akbash etc etc, living 24/7 with our flocks for predator control.
They work, and are the price of doing business in a lot of places, but this is one of the downsides.

[jaykay]

Sometimes it's called 'hydatid'

[dyedinthewool]

Been doing a bit of googling to find out more - but other than telling me that the dog/possible fox is the original contaminator and that the gid infects the sheep I cannot find anything about whether the paddocks that the ram has been in are now contaminated and whether my other sheep may pick up a 'gid/' from the  ram lamb (he was such a sweety) poor thing. Or does it the 'end' within the the ram lamb.

[Blinkers]

Ah, no the rest of your stock should be fine.  I don't think it can be passed on, it is something that's picked up from the ground......as far as I know.    Canadian Sheepfarmer may know more, but I think it stops at the animal that its gained access to.....if you see what I mean.

[Welshcob]

It sounds like echinococcus to me. It is a tapeworm of canids (which are the definitive hosts) and it is transmitted to the intermediate host (sheep, cattle and other erbivores) by eating food contaminated with their eggs. It is also a zoonosis, so people could get infected with eggs.

The result, as you've been told, is cysts in the meat (and other organs, it tends to go to liver, lungs, brain etc) which condemn the carcass. If the meat with cysts is eaten by a canid, the parasite cycle can start again.

Other sheep won't have caught it from your ram as it needs the passage through dog/fox feces to transmit, and also if you are sure that they won't have had contact with dogs whilst with you, this sort of cysts can take months, even years to develop. I would say the ram picked the infection up before you got him.

[dyedinthewool]

Thanks all,
Found several articles on a vaccination programme for ALL dogs on farms in Wales, would have been interesting to know if the farm my ram came from was participating in the scheme.
 
Got real worried that I'd infected the ground.  Looks like a £100 down the drain and very expensive lambs when they get here in March.

[jaykay]

It would be worming of dogs you'd need not vaccination, though I supposed owners who vaccinate are maybe more likely to worm as well?

[lachlanandmarcus]

If foxes count as canids could it still not come from fox poo - they do a lot of it on one of our fields (def fox not dog)?

[bigchicken]

Yes foxes are carriers but it is the dog owners who always gets the flack. sorry about your loss

[Remy]

That's interesting, yet another sheep related condition I've never heard of!  My area is rife with foxes and my fields always have foxpoo on them, I also have dogs but they are all wormed.  Sorry you found out the hard way - if it's any consolation I daren't add up the losses I've suffered this year .. 

[jaykay]

In order to get Echinococcus, the foxes would have to eat infected sheep carcasses. So it's controllable in the fox population in that way, even if not by worming them.