FLIES

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Flies are weird This year we have had the least flies I have ever seen in my life! It must be a regional thing, it was a dry summer here but, now the ground is so wet you can't drive across it, I gues it's like a weather pattern or something!
 
Depending on the situation, i.e. pasture, rotational grazing, drylot, etc., there are different ways of dealing with flys but they all boil down pretty much to sanitation and making the cows uninviting to the flys. Direct spraying of the cattle with pesticides, rubs, mops, dust bags, pour ons are all secondarey controls. Eliminating the breeding/larval host locations are the primary controls. IGR in the minerals controls the larval situation, eliminating wet areas will help with the breeding environment depending on the particualr fly. If a dry lot, composting the manure will help with both.

dun
 
Speaking of flies. We put out a Rabon mineral block that's supposed to help with the fly problem and I think it does. Now something that makes me go Hummmmmmmmm is looking at the cows yesterday when we put out another round of blocks was most of them had very few flies on their backs/sides, but there were two or three (one in particular) that had a very heavy coating of flies. Now I just figure that particular cow has a genetic make-up the flies like. Do you guys have any guesses. She came up to get at the blocks just like everybody else. And this isn't just yesterday, it's been this way all summer. This is probably going to go in the "Life's little unsolved mysteries" file for me unless ya'll know the answer.

Thanks
Cuz
 
The flies were nuts here (it's colder now, about 5 C now, so there ain't many around), enough to make Dad run the herd through to put some Lysoff pour-on on them. AND they (the flies) congregated on the house, on the car, and crapped all over the place... :roll:
 
CUZ":1kwnfdaj said:
Speaking of flies. We put out a Rabon mineral block that's supposed to help with the fly problem and I think it does. Now something that makes me go Hummmmmmmmm is looking at the cows yesterday when we put out another round of blocks was most of them had very few flies on their backs/sides, but there were two or three (one in particular) that had a very heavy coating of flies. Now I just figure that particular cow has a genetic make-up the flies like. Do you guys have any guesses. She came up to get at the blocks just like everybody else. And this isn't just yesterday, it's been this way all summer. This is probably going to go in the "Life's little unsolved mysteries" file for me unless ya'll know the answer.

Thanks
Cuz
Click to expand...

i have a few cows that are always the first to get flies and they will be just covered. they are all OLD cows.
 
Thanks Beefy. Our 2 or 3 "fly attracters" are not really that old -4 to 6 years old. Your comment about this happening with your older cows makes me wonder if this might be some type of early warning indicator of these cows productivity. Like a lot of things signs are out there, if you just know how to read them.

Thanks again
Cuz
 
ive always assumed it was hormonal with some cows- figured they might have more testosterone than the average cow since bulls are always covered in flies. and that older cows just get muskier smelling with age? i swear the flies cover these cows the day the pour-on wears off.
 
~

As Beefy stated:

The bull always has more flies on him.

Second to him are all the older BLACK cows.
The red yearlings have the least.

Half of our herd has been sold because of our horrible lack of hay due to all the rain.
Now I can go out into the field and hand spray the cows since there are now less than 50 cows with calves.

Lasts about 6 days.

Rabon blocks worked well for us too.

Moving the cows out of wet areas was hopeless this year since it never stopped raining.
We had trout on some of the fields.
 
i always notice a lot of flies on the older angus cows. however the one that gets them the worst is the old charolais cow and next to her is an old charolais x angus.
 
I just stopped using fly blocks after 3 years using them. The fly control was pretty good but I miss my dung beetles and I hope they will come back. Plus the cows eat it like candy and it gets mighty expensive.

Sprayed them in the pen with Lintox yesterday for the first time, using a 12 volt sprayer. Should have run them down the chute to do it. The pump noise spooked them but they seemed to enjoy the spray hitting their backs. Would have been better to walk amongst them with a back pack sprayer.

Used about $8 worth of Lintox which is about the cost of one fly block and they would eat 1 to 2 blocks per day.
gabby
 
the flies here in virginia are bad this year too....the place to really get em is in the manure pile....we are trying those fly predators from spaulding labs...they are harmless and the little guys attack and feed on the fly eggs in the manure....seems to be working some but will not know for sure till next year
 

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