Liver Fluke

[grassfarmer]

The cow has really gone down hill since I started this thread, I thought initially she was looking a little poorer than last year but she would rear her calf through to fall but she has now taken a drastic downturn. She is swollen through her brisket, has slowed right down in her movements and the manure is just hosing out of her. Looks like a major organ failure to me so maybe she will get into the 4D program yet.
I've never really backed this vet theory of if in doubt shoot them full of anti-biotic, it seems irresponsible to me.

[15444]

Swollen through the brisket?! That's not liver fluke! I also think it's hardware. Give her a magnet right now!

[grassfarmer]

I don't think so 15444, aren't the symptoms of hardware disease the cow passing very dry or no manure also stopping eating? This cow is doing neither of these plus she has a longer history in that she was out of puff sometimes in the winter after walking a distance. These spell heart trouble to me and the fluke i'm talking about usually kills cows by overstraining the heart ultimately. The kind of deaths in your area seem to be slightly different in that they are linked to clostridial diseases. I'd never heard of hardware till I came here - it must be pretty rare surely? or maybe not given the scrap yards that many cattle graze among out here.
I'll hopefully get a p.m. done on this cow once she dies - for now she is just looking miserable. With 2 inches of rain overnight I was looking miserable too this morning after checking cow!

[kato]

Hardware is very common here. Fence staples can be a culprit. Are barbed wire fences as prevalent in England as here? If not, maybe that explains the lower hardware incidence.

Metal materials are heavy, and can settle in the reticulum. They grind around in there, and can perforate the stomach, and irritate the heart, because it's right up against it. Sometimes the effort of carrying a calf, and delivering the calf can trigger the damage. Next comes infection, and then congestive heart failure. They quit eating, lose weight, and sometimes stand funny with a bit of a hump in their backs from the pain. If it hasn't progressed too far, a magnet will stick to the metal, drop it to the bottom of the stomach, and keep it there so it doesn't keep moving around poking holes.

Sadly, once it gets to the swollen brisket phase, the heart failure is quite advanced, and the prognosis is not good.

I bet lots of people here have been through this exact problem. I know we have.

[15444]

Quit eating, lose weight and hunch their back over....that is exactly what ours do when they have hardware. I still say that if your slip her a magnet, she will turn around.

The liver fluke probably isn't prevalent in Alberta or SK because you need both a carrier (deer or moose), and consistently wet ground, with snails existing in them. Our area has the right conditions 24/7, 8 months of the year, so liver fluke is prevalent.

[cowman]

I actually have never heard of any cattle getting liver flukes in my area. I wonder why and where they might come from? Without a doubt the deer and moose populations are out of control and growing...at least around here...could they be carriers of flukes?
It is almost impossible to entice hunters out anymore as the goofy allottment, as well as high costs, has pretty well disgusted a lot of them from hunting. Instead we have a government department that "manages" the wildlife population! I often wonder how they do that when they seem to be mostly sitting behind a desk in Edmonton?

[grassfarmer]

Got the cow 4D'd today - post mortum shows an old cow with her heart just packing in, no hardware, no fluke. Had old cow lungs too with quite an area of them not doing a lot. She was probably a teenager who doesn't owe me a lot - had 5 calves in the 4 years i've had her but we will need to rear her current one.