bull with cyst or ?

[zvmorris]

Hello, my registar black angus bull, 3yrs old, has a cyst located on his lower right jaw. The vet looked at it about 6 mos ago, cut into and removed some pus, said it was nothing serious, proably an absessed thorn puncture. Here is the meds he put the bull on sodium iodide, roganic iodide powder, chlortetracycline-50. We fed him for about 2 wks of this mixture in his feed. It has been 6 mos and the cyst has grown from the size of baseball to softball, the vet looked again it had no pus, just harded tissue. The bull seems to be healthy but his appearence is definitly funny looking with a big knot on the side of his face. Does anyone know what this could be?

 

[Bez!]

Hello, my registar black angus bull, 3yrs old, has a cyst located on his lower right jaw. The vet looked at it about 6 mos ago, cut into and removed some pus, said it was nothing serious, proably an absessed thorn puncture. Here is the meds he put the bull on sodium iodide, roganic iodide powder, chlortetracycline-50. We fed him for about 2 wks of this mixture in his feed. It has been 6 mos and the cyst has grown from the size of baseball to softball, the vet looked again it had no pus, just harded tissue. The bull seems to be healthy but his appearence is definitly funny looking with a big knot on the side of his face. Does anyone know what this could be?

Not sure what it is, but it sounds like time to do some major cutting. If this is not an actual growth in the bone, may be time to hit it with some lidocaine, skin it out and cut it right off - then trim off the extra hide and sew it back up.

Or, time for another visit from a DIFFERENT veterinarian. Did you do any additional follow up from the first veterinarian? 6 months is a long time with no result.

Otherwise sell as a cull.

Registered animals are a dime a dozen - and unless being sold as seed stock - tend to go for meat prices anyways - if there is even a slight genetic possibility - I would not want it in my herd.

Back to you.

Regards,

Bez!

 

[Beefy]

it may be possible to put a band on it and let it fall off. ask your vet. we did this one time to a cow with a mystery growth on her side.

 

[warpaint]

Sounds like it could be Lumpy Jaw. I can't remember the actual name. A friend had a cow with the same thing. He thought for a while she had been snake bit. Vet took a culture and administered antibiotics. Cow is alive and well today. PM Rustler9 about it for details.

 

[Rustler9]

It definitely sounds like lumpy jaw-this happened to a good, five year old cow that I have. From what I've read-lumpy jaw (this is what it's really called-it also has a scientific name but I don't recall what it is) usually occurs in young stock, usually starts before they are two years old but takes time to start forming. It's usually caused by the animal eating roughage that has thorns, sticks etc. that puncture the gum. An abcess begins to form and it can grow into the jaw bone. It can be cured-iodine is the beginning of treatment. We administered this in the feed for two weeks, all of this was after the vet cut into the lump and sent a sample of tissue off for diagnosis.

He told me at first that I had a 50/50 chance of saving the cow-of course I wanted to if possible as she is a registered animal with some stong genetics that I want in my herd, so far she's given me three heifers out of three calves. We then started three weeks of shots-I don't remember the name of the medication-I have a bottle of this at home and will try to remmeber to look at the name of it and let you know. I gave 30 cc's each day and by the time the meds were over the knot was almost completely gone. If you saw the cow today you would never know that she had ever had a knot the size of a baseball on her jaw. When this first started I thought she had been snake bitten. This all began back in September when it was still warm here and snakes were still crawling. We have alot of rattlers and copperheads here in our area. The cow had a fairly young calf on her and had lost some weight, I gave her an extra worming thinking that this would help and that the jaw would go down as other snake bites do. After the jaw didn't go down but increased in size in a month's time I had the vet come out. By the time the vet checked her it had gotten to where she could hardly chew. I pulled the calf off early as it was dragging her down more.

This cow has a good set of triple twist horns and has never been a pet so I had a hell of a time getting the shots in her every day but I was determined to to. I started out roping her each day to get the shots in her but finally started getting her corned in the barn with a corral panel and getting it done taht way. From what I've read this can reoccur over time but if it does I guess I'll try the treatment again. If your bull is worth it to you, you may want to do this.

 

[milkmaid]

Lumpy jaw - aka Actinomycosis. ;-)

 

[warpaint]

Thanks, MM! Had it right on the tip of my tongue. ;-)

 

[milkmaid]

'welcome. ;-)