blackleg in spring calves

[chaser]

good evening was wondering if calves born in spring had 8 way shot in may if they can get blackleg now on pasture. i have lost 2 calves and cant figure out from what have 2 pastures 1/2 mile apart on 1 pasture lose 1 or 2 calves every year. when i find them coyotes have them ate up thanks

[nicolaas]

sometimes they just die, some years we lose a couple for no apparent reason when they are a few hundred pounds... sometimes even in late fall with snow on ground. bad hearts?

[kato]

No vaccine is 100%, but it's really hard to tell without having one checked out. If you can find one before the coyotes do, you could take it in for a post mortem. Hopefully you won't have to do that though, because you won't lose any more calves.

There are so many ways to lose a calf. The list is long.

[SADIE]

To follow up on Kato's comment.

1)Could be a "blackleg" or another clostridial event but?

2)Late summer and fall pnuemonia is always high differential that comes to mind.

---usually this is sudden death on one or two of the bigger older calves.

---other possibilities is still "alfalfa bloat", lightning. IF it was earlier in the summer the hairball, twisted gut syndrome.

I have seen all of this when in vet practice and now as my own rancher operator.

[ASRG]

If I was you I'd get your local vet out right now! When two drop dead at this stage in the game there could be a problem.
Several years ago I had this very scenario....turns out I had IBR. The vet figured it out right away and we went into panic mode and treated every animal on the place. I think we lost one more.
I had never vacinated for IBR prior to this wreck. A neighbor had a feeder calf he had just bought get in with my cows a short time before this.

[SADIE]

ASRG---you are correct. Late summer pneumonia or acute shipping fever has been going on and properly diagnosed for years dating back to the 1970s & 80s when the IBR, PI3 BRSV BVD combination vaccines were first introduced in the market place. The concept first started to vaccinate and do a pre-weaning vaccine. Practicing vets who saw the pna during harvest starting to implement the protocal at branding time in the spring as a second needle with the clostridial sleeper needle.

The top of my differential diagnostic "thinking" in a case like this is always "Acute shipping fever". Expecially if it is greater than 1 calf.

Like I mentioned ---usually in the biggest "Bull" "steer calves" that get kit first.

To get out of the wreck again it is gather and run them through and treat the group with the proper antibiotics along with the vaccination in the face of an outbreak.

Going forward--you can sit on this and watch, check more often. Next winter and spring encorporate the IBRS combo as a spring calf-hood vaccination program.

[ASRG]

Sadie: If I remember correctly everything got a nasal shot and anything with any kind of fever got a shot of micodil. I know it was fairly costly.....and yes they were the biggest steers calves.