Oh the joy...

[Aaron]

of experiencing a new symptom in a cow. :shock: Had a cow come up this past weekend, looking a little gaunt and drooling a bit. Never seen a cow drool like that before. After spending the last night or two looking through past threads and my Merck's Vet manual, I think I have narrowed down my focus (my, ahem, preliminary diagnosis) to woody tongue. RR's old thread a couple years ago on the subject was a very good resource. Going to get her in the squeeze tomorrow and have a look inside....hoping I caught this early. :cowboy:

 

[rockridgecattle]

Woody tongue is fast acting. If you suspect it, you will need the iodine given intravenusly (sp) for a faster recovery. The doc gave two bottles right off the bat, and then said, if memory serves another dose in 48 hours if the swelling does not go down. As well an injectable for a few days.
What i do know for sure is the woody tongue cow did not rebreed the following season, even with the extra grocieries we dumped ino her. Hubby has a soft spot for his cows so she got one more chance and did come up bred this year.

Good luck, don't mess around with this. This is one of those, do it right the first time around.

 

[Aaron]

This is a fall calver, so she is 4 months bred. Not too keen on using the injectable solution, based on the abortion risk. On Ranchers (old threads), some mentioned using powdered iodine, given at a rate of 2-3 tablespoons per day, along with a tetracycline injectable. They said it worked. :cowboy:

 

[rockridgecattle]

If memory serves on my cow...past...she had a calf at foot and this happened just before bull turn out. If you found the thread, did you note the date?

We have had to iodinen IV cows that had lumpy jaw. Two of those cows were pregnant. One cow was done during calving season. This i remember cause it is the only time we work with cows in that area of the farm. The other was during winter and she would have been in the 5-7 month bred stage. Yes you are right, the riskk to abort or slip the calf. In those instances, we chose to take the risk.

:???: wait, I think i just had a brain fart here. The one during calving we chose to wait until she had her calf. So the moment she had her calf, she was IV'd. :???:

On a side note, we have never had luck with lumpy jaw, and now cull as soon as it happens. We live in an iodine deficient area so we buy this $50.00 pail of iodine to add to the mineral. The pail is about 2 gallons in size. We do not put it in the mineral all year round, but go through about a pail and a half each year. Doing this has reduced the lumpy jaw, foot rot, and woody tongues alot.


Edit, found the date of the post Sept 06. So this cow had a calf at foot and should have been bred, but was open

 

[jerry27150]

had a two year old a few years ago that acted like that. she had lost some of her teeth & got hay stuck in mouth. vet had to pull it out by hand & we fed her grain & hay for a while & she was fine

 

[milkmaid]

I believe the risk of abortion using sodium iodide IV is highest in late gestation; with her only being 4 months bred you may be okay. I had a cow with lumpy jaw last year and I chose to wait until she calved before IV'ing her; the calf was worth more to me than the cow was. To the best of my knowledge, abortions are due to the high level of iodine in the bloodstream which may possibly cause irritation to the placental attachments, causing the cow to slip the calf. Giving iodine IV or orally still results in the same condition = high iodine levels in the blood, which is what you need to treat wooden tongue. I don't think you'd avoid the abortion risk by giving it orally. LuckyP - if you read this - have any thoughts on the matter?

You could always try oxytetracycline IV first and if you don't see a response in 24-48 hours then use iodine - I don't know of any other treatments but oxytet and iodine for wooden tongue, and unfortunately if the cow doesn't eat she'll die. Not like lumpy jaw where you can wait until she calves before treating her.

Cow acts fine otherwise? rabies is always a concern when you go sticking your hand into a cow's mouth.

 

[Aaron]

I believe the risk of abortion using sodium iodide IV is highest in late gestation; with her only being 4 months bred you may be okay. I had a cow with lumpy jaw last year and I chose to wait until she calved before IV'ing her; the calf was worth more to me than the cow was. To the best of my knowledge, abortions are due to the high level of iodine in the bloodstream which may possibly cause irritation to the placental attachments, causing the cow to slip the calf. Giving iodine IV or orally still results in the same condition = high iodine levels in the blood, which is what you need to treat wooden tongue. I don't think you'd avoid the abortion risk by giving it orally. LuckyP - if you read this - have any thoughts on the matter?

You could always try oxytetracycline IV first and if you don't see a response in 24-48 hours then use iodine - I don't know of any other treatments but oxytet and iodine for wooden tongue, and unfortunately if the cow doesn't eat she'll die. Not like lumpy jaw where you can wait until she calves before treating her.

Cow acts fine otherwise? rabies is always a concern when you go sticking your hand into a cow's mouth.

I'm not familiar with IV, nor set-up for it, so it's not an option. Some of the fellows on Ranchers, went the organic iodide oral route and noticed that it didn't have the incidence of abortions that IV iodine did.

I put her on Oxytet LP today for the next 5 days. Gave her a teaspoon of organic iodide, although I may up the amount tomorrow. Base of the tongue seems swollen (flinched when I applied a little pressure to that area) and while eating some soft grass hay that I gave her in isolation, you can see as she chews that she is biting her tongue.

The first third of the tongue looks relatively normal, and I don't smell anything foul about her breath.

I though of rabies initially, but based on her behaviour, it would have to be the paralytic form (not furious), and according to Merck's, paralytic form hosts live only a few hours. Also, no swelling of the tongue in rabies, only paralysis.

She ate a bit of soft hay and I saw her urinate, so everything must be working properly still. I think I may have caught it early enough. I snapped a couple pics of her in the chute today, will post in a bit. :cowboy: