NIGHTMARE

[Lazy M]

Noticed that one of the bulls was looking thin about a month ago. Put him in the barn and began supplementing him with grain. Despite maintaining a good appetite, he continued to rapidly lose condition. Took him to the vet, praying for hardwire.. blood tests came back as, you guessed it, freaking Johnes.. I'm now in the process of blood testing all the heifer's I've retained since having him (he's 71/2).
I spoke with the breeder, a fairly large seedstock operation. He is really freaked out- claims that he blood tests all his stock yearly. He did admit that they had purchased a cow that was diagnosed with Johnes several years ago, but that the cow was kept quarantined from his herd until until her blood test and then promptly hauled off. I not sure what my proper recourse should be with the breeder..maybe nothing, I'm not sure..he hasn't offered anything, but I think he is kind of in shock..he did ask that I email him a copy of the bull's lab report..this sucks.

 

[Hook]

Sucks bad but at least you caught it early instead of years down the road

 

[Lazy M]

Btw: I sold the bull at the local market immediately after his blood test was drawn. I made sure that he was sold as a slaughter bull (not that anyone would have bought him for breeding anyway- he looked like a hungry milk cow). Couldn't believe that he still sold for 88 cwt.

 

[Lazy M]

Sucks bad but at least you caught it early instead of years down the road

He was 7 1/2 yrs old. He could have been shedding for years.

 

[Hook]

True.

 

[Nesikep]

Well, Hope your blood tests on the rest of your animals isn't too grim... What else can I say.. good luck!

 

[Lazy M]

Well, Hope your blood tests on the rest of your animals isn't too grim... What else can I say.. good luck!

Thanks

 

[Waterway65]

How prevelant is johnies in beef herds? Can it be eliminated once it is introduced? Mel

 

[Lazy M]

How prevelant is johnies in beef herds? Can it be eliminated once it is introduced? Mel

From the articles that I've read, experts estimate that 8% of beef herds have at least 1 cow with it. They think that it is actually higher than this but most folks just assume that a puny cow has hardwire and takes them to the sale barn without getting tested. If this had been a cow instead of a bull, I'd have probably done the same. Its supposedly in 38% of dairy herds.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

Lazy M.....sorry to hear that.

Good luck with the rest of the tests.

Katherine

 

[hillsdown]

He is the perfect age to start showing symptoms but yes that shedding has been happening since he was a yearling . That totally sucks Lazy M !!!!

I had a nightmare like that about 9 years ago, I sold all the claves that were born that year , just incase they were exposed to her shedding . Thankfully for me in a sense, she was purchased and went down hill right afterwards ,so her shedding was only a few months here . I did however have to send a lot of really nice calves to slaughter that otherwise would have made d@m good breeding stock. The original breeder basically gave me the finger and when I got the association involved they told him to settle with me asap ,which he did not. He offered me embryos out of her as compensation and said that she must have gotten Johnes from my herd , dumb bleep .... I should have taken the @sshole to court because he cost me 6 grand in the cow , a thousand in semen and a young stock crop that was priceless.

Now my herd is closed and now that we are past the 7 year tell tale symptom make and everyone seems very healthy and fat I think / I know I did the right thing for me and my customers . It was a h$ll of a price to pay and I still have not made back that loss of revenue , as it was my decision to buy her so the lost money came out of my personal account to refund the Ranch . Oh well , holidays are overrated anyways :roll:

You need to test everyone that has been born and exposed to his shedding at your place . Then go from there and if you sold young stock from him as breeding stock you need to inform your customers . NIGHTMARE it is that and more .

So very sorry you are going through this . Keep your vet involved in everything you do and also contact you county extension agency as they will have some advise and perhaps some new alternatives to what needs to be done . Good luck . My heart goes out to all of you .

 

[Lazy M]

Thanks HD.
I've decided not to save any heifers from this years calf crop, and will test those that I've already kept since the bull has been around. Thankfully, I am strctly commercial so I don't have to track down anyone. Its is REALLY going to be hard to send my best heifers to market, though. I'm trying to be nice, but the little devil on my shoulder keeps whispering to post the freaking lab report on the breeders facebook page as they still haven't offered to even provide me with a replacement bull (although I don't really know if I'd accept another animal of theirs on my place).

 

[hillsdown]

Thanks HD.
I've decided not to save any heifers from this years calf crop, and will test those that I've already kept since the bull has been around. Thankfully, I am strctly commercial so I don't have to track down anyone. Its is REALLY going to be hard to send my best heifers to market, though. I'm trying to be nice, but the little devil on my shoulder keeps whispering to post the freaking lab report on the breeders facebook page as they still haven't offered to even provide me with a replacement bull (although I don't really know if I'd accept another animal of theirs on my place).

Don't be nice Lazy M . I am thinking he knows that it came from his place and you know what you are probably not the first to have an infected product of his.
I say F him , lets let this POS reap the seeds he has sewn .

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

You post it on his face book he will delete it as fast as he sees it. Post it here where he can't delete it.

 

[tom4018]

He is the perfect age to start showing symptoms but yes that shedding has been happening since he was a yearling . That totally sucks Lazy M !!!!

I had a nightmare like that about 9 years ago, I sold all the claves that were born that year , just incase they were exposed to her shedding . Thankfully for me in a sense, she was purchased and went down hill right afterwards ,so her shedding was only a few months here . I did however have to send a lot of really nice calves to slaughter that otherwise would have made d@m good breeding stock. The original breeder basically gave me the finger and when I got the association involved they told him to settle with me asap ,which he did not. He offered me embryos out of her as compensation and said that she must have gotten Johnes from my herd , dumb bleep .... I should have taken the @sshole to court because he cost me 6 grand in the cow , a thousand in semen and a young stock crop that was priceless.

Now my herd is closed and now that we are past the 7 year tell tale symptom make and everyone seems very healthy and fat I think / I know I did the right thing for me and my customers . It was a h$ll of a price to pay and I still have not made back that loss of revenue , as it was my decision to buy her so the lost money came out of my personal account to refund the Ranch . Oh well , holidays are overrated anyways :roll:

You need to test everyone that has been born and exposed to his shedding at your place . Then go from there and if you sold young stock from him as breeding stock you need to inform your customers . NIGHTMARE it is that and more .

So very sorry you are going through this . Keep your vet involved in everything you do and also contact you county extension agency as they will have some advise and perhaps some new alternatives to what needs to be done . Good luck . My heart goes out to all of you .

Just trying to learn here, so once you made it past 7 years you don't have to worry about anything that was exposed to the infected cow or bull? I a cow for slaughter in the past that I wish I had tested, thought it was other issues but hindsight made me wonder. The thought of it popping up in my herd scares me. At what age is one prone to be infected?

 

[hillsdown]

They get it as calves from infected cattle and start shedding soon after , fecal matter and it is also transferred from in utero and infected milk . They however do not show symptoms of it until later , and usually the latest they show is around 7-8 years of age in a very healthy group of cattle . However it could be sooner and as young as 2 years old showing symptoms .

 

[tom4018]

They get it as calves from infected cattle and start shedding soon after , fecal matter and it is also transferred from in utero and infected milk . They however do not show symptoms of it until later , and usually the latest they show is around 7-8 years of age in a very healthy group of cattle . However it could be sooner and as young as 2 years old showing symptoms .

At what age are they no longer at risk of being infected? For example if you had a weaned or yearling heifer when a infected animal came on a farm would they been at risk?
Just trying to learn here, sorry for so many questions.

 

[regolith]

At what age are they no longer at risk of being infected? For example if you had a weaned or yearling heifer when a infected animal came on a farm would they been at risk?
Just trying to learn here, sorry for so many questions.

From what I've read every animal infected was infected before the age of six months, the cut off for being susceptible appears to be around then.
That guy who 'quarantined' his infected bought-in cow was wasting his time unless he kept all youngstock off that piece of pasture for goodness knows how many years, I don't recall how long it can last in the soil.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I might have dodged this bullet - realistically there's no way I can control exposure in the way my herd has been managed but if about seven years is it... the oldest animals born to my herd are eight years old this year and to date I've never seen the symptoms in a cow originating within the herd. We have had clinical positives that were culled, most recently in 2010.
Episodes of stress can trigger the symptoms, so it's often seen soon after calving.

 

[Lazy M]

They get it as calves from infected cattle and start shedding soon after , fecal matter and it is also transferred from in utero and infected milk . They however do not show symptoms of it until later , and usually the latest they show is around 7-8 years of age in a very healthy group of cattle . However it could be sooner and as young as 2 years old showing symptoms .

At what age are they no longer at risk of being infected? For example if you had a weaned or yearling heifer when a infected animal came on a farm would they been at risk?
Just trying to learn here, sorry for so many questions.

Most of the vets that I've spoken to and articles that I read indicat that cattle are extremely susceptible within 30 days of birth and have been shown to still contract with heavy exposure at up to 6 months.
In my case, any way you slice it, the bull got it while at the breeders farm as he was sold as a 18 mo old.
I'm going to still give the breeder time to make this right by at least compensating me for a replacement before i do anything rash like posting the bull's registration number on here. After discussing his practices, I'm willing to agree that this may have been a freak anomaly. I suggested this to him thru email yesterday and haven't recieved a response.

 

[tom4018]

At what age are they no longer at risk of being infected? For example if you had a weaned or yearling heifer when a infected animal came on a farm would they been at risk?
Just trying to learn here, sorry for so many questions.

From what I've read every animal infected was infected before the age of six months, the cut off for being susceptible appears to be around then.
That guy who 'quarantined' his infected bought-in cow was wasting his time unless he kept all youngstock off that piece of pasture for goodness knows how many years, I don't recall how long it can last in the soil.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I might have dodged this bullet - realistically there's no way I can control exposure in the way my herd has been managed but if about seven years is it... the oldest animals born to my herd are eight years old this year and to date I've never seen the symptoms in a cow originating within the herd. We have had clinical positives that were culled, most recently in 2010.
Episodes of stress can trigger the symptoms, so it's often seen soon after calving.

Thanks, I did read on one site saying that it could live in the soil for a year.