Sheep by Courtney McCrea

Liver fluke (fasciolosis)

y0e02 — 2024-02-12 10:58:25 UTC

Caused by fasciola hepatica.

Diagnosis via faecal sample ELISA test, or post mortem showing chronic liver damage and mature fluke in the bile ducts and bladder.

Manage by withholding animals from wet ground during high risk period (winter and spring). Reduce exposure to the snail host, fence off drains, ponds, watercourses.

Avoid anthelmintic resistance by allowing natural immunity to develop. When worming do not move straight on to clean pasture, that will increase proportion of resistant worm eggs that will be on the pasture.

Protazoa (coccidiosis)

y0e02 — 2024-02-12 11:09:46 UTC

Diagnosis via faecal samples and counting oocysts present.

Management by providing dry, clean bedding. Avoid stressing stock. Avoid contamination o drinkers with faeces. Keep young stock in tight age groups of about 2 weeks (mainly lambs that are overstocked effected).

Avoid anthelmintic resistance by dosing according to heaviest weight in the flock, not the average weight. Under dosing encourages anthelmintic resistance.

Ticks (Ixodes Ricinus)

y0e02 — 2024-02-12 11:24:24 UTC

Caused by a change in farming. Found in moist air. Can transmit diseases by sucking blood of many different animals of different species. In flocks of sheep in the UK, tick control depends on the use of acaricides to prevent infestation.Ticks can be prevented on sheep through the use of synthetic pyrethroid based pour-ons that contain cypermethrin, such as Crovect Pour On. A single dose of this will be efficient for 10 weeks but will kill off the majority of ticks in 3 hours. These ticks can transfer from sheep to other animals and humans which can cause lyme disease. The symptoms of ticks being present and sucking the blood of sheep are a sudden fever, depression and weight loss.

Sheep Keds (Melophagus Ovinus)

y0e02 — 2024-02-12 11:28:31 UTC

Pierce skin with mouthparts and such sheep blood. Ked bites cause pruritus over the host's body. The sheep will become irritated and scratch themselves, damaging the wool. This is how the presence of keds can be noticed. Keds are sensitive to chemicals and dips. Insecticides with residual activity are required for emerging keds. Sheep are treated after shearing. They are sheared before lambing especially, to remove pupae and adult keds. Another way to treat keds is to hand dust the sheep.