Cattle Health Problem

[grassfarmer]

Got a sudden health problem affecting our yearlings and wondered if anyone had any ideas. Yearlings were on a swamp/bush pasture with pairs until Monday. Monday we sorted off the yearling heifers put them on tame grass elsewhere and returned the cows, steers and bulls to the swamp.
Wednesday morning 2 steers and one heifer shaking heads, salivating looking uncomfortable. Thursday morning heifer dead, 2 steers looking worse and another 10 cases between the two lots. All suffering photo-sensitivity - noses are red/black and much head shaking going on but not so much salivating.
Had the vet out, did an autopsy - lots of internal blood - lungs were full, liver pale, heart normal. The live ones hearts are beating fast (110-120)
indicating thin blood as a result of red blood cells being destroyed? One heifer urinated and it was really red, almost blood. She has a badly swollen face also, the rest less so. Vet is struggling for causes - waiting blood test results.
I suspected poisoning by plant initially but the symptoms don't really fit any of the known toxic weeds. Blue/green algae was suggested but again not entirely fitting the symptoms. Chlostridial disease was suggested but they have had 8-way twice so should be OK. No opportunities for pesticide/industrial poisoning where they were although the river runs through the block. Owner of land has never experienced anything of this nature in over 60 years on this land.
Any other suggestions or similar experiences? It's got us stumped.

[SADIE]

Just came in from baling. First thought is a "photosensitivity" of some sort. Especially "puffy heads" and shaking heads on animals.

There was two types when I saw them in practice----ACute and chronic.

Just my first thoughts.

[ProFarmer]

Check for a bag of old canola or the like thrown in there it has happened..

[grassfarmer]

Thanks, I spoke to someone tonight who had experience of blue/green toxic algae and I'm leaning towards that being the most likely cause. The weather conditions suggested to him likely conditions for the algae prospering. Time will tell, I'll see how they are doing in the morning.

[SADIE]

When was this area last grazed.

Photosensitivity is usually a result of turning cattle in and plant or plants likely mature---pollen, seeds etc.

Forget about causes and treat the symptoms. The days when I was in practice had the group run through and given Penlong S Plus---Long acting penicillin, antihistamine and dexamethasone but that product long pulled off the market.

Need the combination of the three to treat the lot.

I am haying right now and in this area the hay crops are rank with lots of plant mixtures tall and seed set at this time. If this was grazed I would see photosensitivity here also. This really showed up the worst on cattle with "white" hair on body but looking at the last cattlemen your cattle are all dark pigmented.

Hope that helps you

[DogPatch]

Did the hearts have burst blood vessels?

In older animals, with the fluid filled lungs, they could have had hyperthermia induced shock, and pneumonia. If they were without shade, or got running from the flies, fighting with the bulls and panting, they might have overheat? When you removed some of the animals, did they do more fighting to reestablish a pecking order?

The photosensitivity happens to us all when we get bad sunburns, or high fevers. But I think it happens most often after eating something..... like mustards, St John's wort, and some sprays. No change of an overspray with something?

Good luck finding out.......

[coppertop]

Grassfarmer, sorry to hear of your
troubles. Hope you can pin point the
cause and things clear up My vets have
said that they have seen more weird
illnesses this year than any other.

Have you spoken to your Ag Fieldman,
they have a wealth of information on
various grasses, weeds etc., and the
various dangers associated with some of
them.

[smcgrath76]

I took a quick look through
photosensitivity on the Merck Manual
site...
http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.js
p?
cfile=htm/bc/22815.htm&word=photosensitivi
ty
There is quite a bit of information there,
and some that may trigger with what you
see at home.

[kato]

I googled around a bit too, and that algae thing keeps coming up. Maybe a water sample from that swamp is in order? How are the cows and calves? Are they OK?

Keep us posted on how it's going.

[RShields]

Can't see how your problem can be back in the swamp if you have cattle in there with no problems.
I saw some of this one time when I turned cattle in on second cut Meadow Brome in the fall.
http://www.iowabeefcenter.org/content/Beef%20Cattle%20Handbook/Pulmonary_Edema.pdf
Hope it passes and you have seen the worst of it. Very scary situation for you I'm sure. Best of luck.

[coppertop]

A neighbour has had some weird stuff
with 3-4 month old calves. They are out
on grass looking healthy one day and
dead the next. A Post Mortem showed
blood in the lungs but all other organs
looked healthy.
He lost six calves then everything was
fine for a month. After that one calf
after the other would have droopy ears,
he would get them in and either treat
them with Resflor or Biomycin and most
of them perked up in a day. He has one
that ended up with several abcesses
which drained, she is healthy but has
patches of skin missing, and he has
another that has a severe eye infection.
The vets cannot pin point anything so he
keeps checking them several times a day.
No new sick ones for well over a month .
He is lucky he has pasture at home and
they weren't out on some remote pasture
where checking and treating them would
have been a lot more difficult.

[grassfarmer]

Thanks for all the replies - things are looking up - haven't lost anything further although 3 are still pretty sick. We will treat with long and short acting penicillan and banamin. I think they will all pull through though don't know how it will affect their subsequent performance.
Really looks like the blue/green algae is most likely cause. None of the poison weeds look likely due to the time lapse between removing some from the swamp and getting the first case.
If affected both solid red and solid white coated cattle in about the same proportions. The heart of the one we autopsied was in good shape.
The cattle were not overheating, had plenty shade.
Unfortunately the algae thing is hard to prove by sampling - I'm told it can change from toxic to non-toxic in 24 hours. Plus in this case guess which pothole/swamp/slough they actually drank out of as there are water sources everywhere. As well we had 2.25 inches of rain on Monday/Tuesday which would dilute some pools and also flooded others when the river came up. Cows/calves were unaffected and less than 25% of the feeders showed any signs. Maybe only one group drank out of a particular pool of water? maybe the cows are smarter than the yearlings and the calves likely drink enough milk that they aren't taking enough water on?
Still a bit of a mystery and it looks unlikely that we will definitively pinpoint the source. Lesson learned though - I just won't rent that pasture again as it's just not worth the risk.

[kato]

Glad to hear it's calmed down. That's pretty scarey stuff. Hopefully it's finished.

[farmers_son]

Did you consider acute nitrate poisoning?

See:
http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.jsp?cfile=htm/bc/212300.htm

[grassfarmer]

Another interesting suggestion Farmers_son but again it doesn't really seem to fit. The land in question is never fertilised, it's natural riparian pasture so the plants would be unlikely to have high nitrate levels I would think. Also I saw no mention of photo-sensitivity in the article which is the major symptom visible in our case. Maybe the blood work will tell us more when it comes back.