Electronic Sheep Tags

I am still trying to understand the reasoning behind the need for electronic identification of sheep. The argument is that following the problems tracing sheep movements after the foot and mouth outbreak in 2001 electronic ear tagging will make a significant improvement to the way that animal movements are traced. Sheep and goats caused particular problems in 2001 because few of them showed any clinical signs of the disease yet they were able to spread the infection to other ruminants and pigs. Britain has the highest number of sheep of any of the European Countries and we have a tradition of animals moving to different areas of the country for fattening and winter grazing. Most of these movements involve stable groups of animals rather than individuals.

Tracing Sheep       

The identification and recording requirements for sheep have changed over the years. The current requirements for double tagging, which started in 2005, seems to work well. At markets if we want to trace an animal’s owner one phone call with the herd number of the ewe rapidly gives all of the information needed. Having an electronic tag does not always make tracing animals any easier, first of all you need to carry a tag reader and we will still need to ring up to get information about where the animal has come from. Electronic tags can be lost as easily as the conventional ones, the argument for double tagging was that it was unlikely that both tags would be lost on a single journey so there would still be one tag left to identify the animal.

Costs Involved

As I understand it electronic identification will not be mandatory for sheep that are likely to be slaughtered before twelve months of age as these movements can be recorded on a batch basis. Goats too are exempt, because there are fewer than 160,000 goats in the country they do not need to have the electronic ear tags. I could see that there are advantages if all of your sheep were identified in this way if you could load them at a dedicated loading bay before they left your farm. The problem is that this is an expensive system with tags cost  between £1.20 and £1.50 each, stick readers cost £495 and a reader to capture data as the sheep pass a race will be more than £1,300.00 without the computer software to make sense of the numbers.

Disease Control

It would seem to me that the most important thing that we can do to stop the spread of Foot and Mouth Disease should it ever be allowed to return to this country is to put in place an immediate animal movement standstill. It was the delay in implementing a nationwide standstill that proved to be so costly. Electronic Identification may solve some tracing problems, but it will cause others and it is wrong to exempt some classes of animals just because there are low numbers involved. One goat in a van can spread the infection as quick as a load of sheep on a lorry. It is wrong to impose these additional costs on sheep farmers when there will be few benefits.

Vaccination Trial

DEFRA reports that the first tuberculosis vaccine for badgers will be tested in six areas of the country next year. They propose to trap badgers and inject them with ten times the human dose of BCG vaccine each year for five years. The areas for the trial are near Market Drayton, Worcester, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Tiverton and Exeter. The understanding is that the vaccine will not have any effect on animals that already have the disease, but it will be able so stop it developing if each badger gets a dose of the vaccine every year before the natural infection has a chance to develop.

DIY Disease Control

The trial is going to cost up to £10 million and is designed not to test the efficiency of the vaccine, but to test the method by which it can be deployed by contractors trained by the Food and Environment Research Agency. It is proposed that if the trial is successful you will be able to go on a course to be trained to administer the vaccine on your own farms. It is understood that you will be able to purchase vaccine each year to give to the badgers. I would ask you not to get too excited about this trial as it will go on for five years and it may take several more years before DEFRA decide if it has been successful or not.

Pigs and Swine Flu

So called Swine Flu is doing the rounds and you will no doubt know of somebody who has the infection or maybe you have had it yourself. At the moment pigs are being monitored to see if they have had the disease. Reports from Canada indicate that it is usually a mild disease in pigs, there is some sneezing and coughing, but most animals are recovering fully after five days or so with few losses. The H1N1 virus has never been isolated from pigs in Europe, but there is a chance that it could spread from a pig keeper to his pigs. As a precaution it would be wise if you are showing symptoms not to feed any pigs. Also make sure any vegetable waste that has been in the house is not fed to pigs when the infection is about. It is very unlikely that you could ever catch the swine flu virus from pigs. It is more likely that they will catch it from us, but it is not worth taking any chances as we do not yet know how DEFRA will react if they find a positive case on your farm.

Online Store

This month we have started a new venture at the surgery, we have an Online Shop where you can purchase dog and cat food at any time of the day or night. It is hoped that when the shop gets established we will be able to introduce other products as well. You can take a look at what is on offer through the practice web site at www.MinsterleyVets.4mg.com and follow the link to the Online Store. The easiest way to find our web site is to Google Minsterley Vets. Please note we do not normally stock any of these new items so you can only purchase them through the Online Store.

Coughing Cattle

The warm and wet conditions have meant that for the third year in a row parasites have been able to survive in large numbers. There is a particular risk from lungworm at the moment. Usually at this time of the year lungworm larvae retreat into the ground during the day so they can remain moist and viable. Cattle will only come into contact with them when the graze at night and early in the morning. This year they are swallowing more larvae and animals are coughing already. The adult larvae cause a lot of damage to the lungs so it is important to worm the animals as soon as the coughing starts to avoid further losses.

Fiona’s Walk

In September Fiona is going on a sponsored walk to climb fourteen of the mountains in Wales that are over three thousand foot high in a single day to raise money for Multiple Sclerosis Research. This is a worthy cause and there is a sponsorship form at the Surgery.

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