already showing disease symptoms, either scours or pneumonia, “those animals act like Typhoid Marys,” says Spire. “They end up spreading disease. They quickly build up the level of disease organisms within an environment and can expose other animals.” When calves already exhibiting disease, Spire says
he brings those pairs off the herd. “I can manage those as a smaller group, but I’m just trying to protect the population by handling those away from susceptible herd mates,” he says. Adverse weather can also affect the extent of disease
in the herd. As Spire says, “The old adage is, ‘You can have cattle cold. You can have cattle wet. But you can’t have cattle cold and wet.’ When a baby calf comes out, it only has so much energy reserve available until it starts eating well. If they try to keep warm by shivering or just laying down and trying to huddle themselves up, those calves are burning that energy store up.” That can leave the calf without the strength to
fi ght off a low-level pathogen infection, particularly if the protection they receive from the cow has been compromised. Spire says, “Most of the time when we have a good
milking cow and good amounts of colustrum, those calves are getting enough energy and can take short- term weather stresses. But if there are any issues, then things can go wrong. Feeding cows poor-quality for- age will decrease milk production or lower the qual- ity colostrum. As cows age older than 8 or 9 years of age, have old mastitic udders, balloon teats of a size so calves can’t nurse well, or a broken-down bag — any of those defects aren’t going to produce the milk level that we need to get the energy level into those calves.” This can happen as well with thin heifers or those on poor-quality forages. Calves that experienced problem births, a condi-
tion generally known as dystocia, also tend to get hit harder by disease. Spire says the offspring of heifers are particularly
susceptible. “The more calving problems you have, the more susceptible those particular calves are to disease,” he says. “That happens for several reasons. One, if it takes a long time to get that calf out, or we have to manipulate it, that calf doesn’t get up and nurse as readily.” If the calf does not get up within an hour and a half,
he says, the herd owner should consider intervention through either colostrum management or antibody management. There are several products on the market that could potentially be employed at this time.
50 The Cattleman February 2014
thecattlemanmagazine.com
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