Beware of scours as spring nears
If spots appear on calves, be prepared to take right action
Spring is just around the corner and with it brings new life and the job of calf rearing — ensure you are ready for calf rearing. Make sure all feeding equipment and sheds are clean and disinfected, especially if there were any diseases in your calves last year.
Calf scours can be a big problem for calves in the first few weeks of life. They can be either nutritional or infectious.
Nutritional scours will often be white in colour and are usually associated with a sudden change in amount of milk being fed. Any changes in feed need to be done gradually to avoid gut upset.
Infectious scours could be bacterial, viral, or protozoal. With infectious diseases it is important to keep the sick calves separate to the healthy calves to reduce spread. When feeding the calves feed the healthy calves first then visit the sick calves.
Clean and disinfect yourself and equipment after visiting the sick
calves. Many of the infectious causes can also cause diarrhoea in people too.
Wear gloves and wash your hands properly afterwards.
When your calves have scours, regardless of the cause, replacing lost fluid is critically important. They are losing fluid and electrolytes in the scours causing imbalance and this is vital to replace.
Electrolyte sachets are mixed up with 2L of lukewarm water and given twice a day. If the calves are too sick to suckle, they may need to be tube fed. This is a tube which goes down the oesophagus, only use one if you know how to use it correctly.
Only tube feed the water and electrolytes, do not tube feed milk. Alternate milk feeds, if they will suckle, with a couple of hours between milk and electrolyte feeds.
Call your vet to investigate any scouring or other sick calves. They can often run in-house testing to find out what the infectious cause of scours is. Based on this they can advise on treatment and management options for your calves.