Please tell me about Anaplasmosis?

[True Grit Farms]

After having a couple of dead new born calves Dr Jones from UGA would like us to send him 20+ blood samples so he can check for anaplasmosis in our herd. My main questions is if he finds anaplasmosis in our herd will we be able to sell our cows? Will our property be quarantined? He mentioned something to my wife that if the cows test positive for anaplasmosis that cows shouldn't go back into the pasture where we found the dead calves. Right now we don't have the time to drawblood and learn about this mess.

 

[M-5]

If your looking for a reason you will certainly find one. A couple of dead calves out of the numbers to run is not alarming.

 

[Bright Raven]

This is a recent thread on it. I think Lucky commented. Check that but I don't think it addressed quarantine or selling your cattle.

I know a higher tier Simmental/Angus operation here that has intensive protocols to deal with anaplasmosis just for the same reasons you are raising these questions.

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=115183

 

[True Grit Farms]

This is a recent thread on it. I think Lucky commented. Check that but I don't think it addressed quarantine or selling your cattle.

I know a higher tier Simmental/Angus operation here that has intensive protocols to deal with anaplasmosis just for the same reasons you are raising these questions.

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=115183

My attention span is to short for all those stinking commercials, worse than a football game. Thanks for the heads up on the thread.

 

[Bright Raven]

This is a recent thread on it. I think Lucky commented. Check that but I don't think it addressed quarantine or selling your cattle.

I know a higher tier Simmental/Angus operation here that has intensive protocols to deal with anaplasmosis just for the same reasons you are raising these questions.

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=115183

My attention span is to short for all those stinking commercials, worse than a football game. Thanks for the heads up on the thread.

This is the post made by Lucky:

pdf and all
As far as I'm aware, the Anaplasmosis vaccine from University Products LLC requires a yearly booster after the initial two-dose series.
Vaccine does not prevent infection, but prevents clinical disease... and yes, those vaccinated animals will test 'seropositive' - but they may also be seropositive due to persistent low-level parasitemia... they won't get sick and die, but could still serve as a source of infection for ticks that may then feed on and transmit the parasite to uninfected cattle.

If I (or my next-door neighbor) had Anaplasmosis in our herd(s)... I would be vaccinating.

The level of CTC allowed in mineral will only protect up to a 750 lb animal - and then, only if they're eating their theoretical 4oz of mineral every day. There's not enough, and consumption is so variable, that I would never trust CTC-medicated mineral to provide 'protection' for mature cows/bulls. It might help, but the likelihood of 'breakthrough' cases is pretty high.
For effective 'control' of clinical disease, cattle need to consume 0.5mg CTC/lb body weight DAILY throughout the vector season(Apr-Nov here). Note that those animals consuming that level of CTC can/will still become infected... they just will be far less likely to develop clinical illness and die.

 

[True Grit Farms]

If your looking for a reason you will certainly find one. A couple of dead calves out of the numbers to run is not alarming.

A couple of dead calves in a row isn't normal for us. I wouldn't be concerned at all if the calves needed some kind of help. Both were fully developed, looked normal and no visible signs of a hard birth. If there's a problem somewhere we need to find out ASAP. The farm visit and blood testing is being covered by the beef checkoff program. I'm just leary of government intervention and opening a can of worms that I can't close.

 

[Bright Raven]

If your looking for a reason you will certainly find one. A couple of dead calves out of the numbers to run is not alarming.

A couple of dead calves in a row isn't normal for us. I wouldn't be concerned at all if the calves needed some kind of help. Both were fully developed, looked normal and no visible signs of a hard birth. If there's a problem somewhere we need to find out ASAP. The farm visit and blood testing is being covered by the beef checkoff program. I'm just leary of government intervention and opening a can of worms that I can't close.

It is especially serious for seedstock producers. Selling breeding stock carrying Anaplasma spp. is a potential business ending disaster.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Here are two sites with info:
http://www.ncagr.gov/vet/FactSheets/Anaplasmosis.htm

https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/cgi/viewcont ... terinarian

 

[JMJ Farms]

Anaplasmosis can cause abortions. But I'm not sure about stillborn calves that are full term. Do you know if these cows were full term?

Edited to add: potential causes of weak and stillborn calves are brucellosis, anaplasmosis, neosporosis, BVD, IBR, Blue Tongue disease, and nitrate toxicity.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

Grit - if I remember correctly, you have a good vaccination program don't you?
What do you use on your cows?

 

[True Grit Farms]

Anaplasmosis can cause abortions. But I'm not sure about stillborn calves that are full term. Do you know if these cows were full term?

Edited to add: potential causes of weak and stillborn calves are brucellosis, anaplasmosis, neosporosis, BVD, IBR, Blue Tongue disease, and nitrate toxicity.

Both calves looked completely normal.

 

[True Grit Farms]

Grit - if I remember correctly, you have a good vaccination program don't you?
What do you use on your cows?

We're some in between with our vaccination program. Everyone gets Triangle 10 HB, Calvary 9 and boosters yearly. We wormed everyone good this year with Cydectin injectable and a white drench. Most of the time we only worm calves and yearlings. We've had two live caves in a row now so things are improving.

 

[Lucky_P]

Worked a case several years ago... well-managed herd with some hiqh quality genetics.
Several near-term abortions occurred over a very short timeframe... fresh fetuses and placenta submitted for diagnostics... absolutely normal, no pathogens detected. But when the cows started dying 3-5 days later, the cause was quite apparent... anaplasmosis.

It may vary from state to state, but to my knowledge, anaplasmosis is not a 'reportable disease' and there's no quarantine or embargo on selling cattle out of an infected herd.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

That's a little scary to hear. Cattle could be moving all over and be carriers. Is it really prevalent? Sounds like a very sneaky threat to our herds. Been around a long time, though.

 

[BRYANT]

After having a couple of dead new born calves Dr Jones from UGA would like us to send him 20+ blood samples so he can check for anaplasmosis in our herd. My main questions is if he finds anaplasmosis in our herd will we be able to sell our cows? Will our property be quarantined? He mentioned something to my wife that if the cows test positive for anaplasmosis that cows shouldn't go back into the pasture where we found the dead calves. Right now we don't have the time to drawblood and learn about this mess.

I think you can sale the cattle might want to sell as ''slaughter only''
Property should not be quarantined it is carried through the blood, needles. preg. checking, and ticks, most vets will tell you that it can be transmitted by the horse fly. some do not agree with that. The year I fought it the vet I was using gave everything a shot of LA200 even if they did not look to have it. If you did that make sure you do not reuse needles.

 

[Lucky_P]

Yes, Jeanne, we have 'spread it around' - a lot - by selling/moving cattle around the country. Misconceptions, misinformation, and poor diagnostic tests in the past have contributed to the problem.
We used to think that 2 doses of long-acting oxytetracycline (LA-OTC) would 'clear' the infection, and that animals that survived the infection would 'clear' on their own. Truth is that neither of those are the case. Clinically-affected cattle that are treated and survive, as well as animals that are infected as calves (which don't become ill because their immune and blood-forming systems are in high-gear since they're rapidly growing) will not be 'cleared', but rather will be chronically infected, with low-level parasitemia, and can serve as a source of infection for naive animals.
The old Complement Fixation test that we used to use to test probably missed as many as 80-85% of those chronic low-level carriers - resulting in a lot of false-test-negative animals being sold around. The newer cELISA test is, however, very sensitive, and quite specific.
Anaplasma strains present in most of the US are tick-vectored, and biting flies like horseflies are of minimal importance in spreading it within a herd.

Whole-herd treatment with a LA-OTC is a double-edged sword, though I'm not sure that it's necessarily falling out of favor. You can't get enough OTC in a cow to kill/clear the organism... you're just slowing it down, hopefully long enough for the cow to kick up production of new red blood cells and survive... but if you treat an animal early in the incubation phase, as soon as the drugs wear off, the parasite picks up right where it left off, and you'll have new clinical cases 3-6weeks later. I saw cases from one herd that lasted from August into December one year, because every time they had another clinical case, they treated everything... and they kept suppressing the pathogen in those animals that were freshly infected... but as soon as the drugs wore off... here we go again.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

So, by all rights, if a cow is diagnosed with it, it should be a kill cow. Obviously, the meat isn't a threat to humans - errrr - right?
Kind of a catch 22 - if she's sick & diagnosed, do you ship her sick - untreated. That would be your only choice I would think. But, by the time she was sick enough for a vet to come out & run tests, you surely would have already treaty with something, so she couldn't be shipped for X number of days, and by then she would be sick again.
Well, that sucks.

 

[Bright Raven]

So, by all rights, if a cow is diagnosed with it, it should be a kill cow. Obviously, the meat isn't a threat to humans - errrr - right?
Kind of a catch 22 - if she's sick & diagnosed, do you ship her sick - untreated. That would be your only choice I would think. But, by the time she was sick enough for a vet to come out & run tests, you surely would have already treaty with something, so she couldn't be shipped for X number of days, and by then she would be sick again.
Well, that sucks.

The proper disposition of an animal confirmed infected with Anaplama ssp. might best be distruction and incineration. A Seedstock producer in my area who raises Simmentals - a producer who I think is one of the most knowledgeable in the business; I have taken Fire Sweep to his operation twice - takes anaplasmosis more seriously than anyone I know. Every animal that leaves his property is tested for anaplasmosis out of concern that he could be at risk of damages for spreading it to a buyers herd.

 

[Jeanne - Simme Valley]

I'm interested to hear Lucky_P knowledge about the meat issue.

 

[Bright Raven]

I'm interested to hear Lucky_P knowledge about the meat issue.

Anaplasmosis occurs in humans, different species infect humans. The concern with sending animals that you know to be carriers to a stockyards is losing control of the final use of the animal. At our stockyards, a buyer may purchase the animal from the ring, put it in his herd, vaccinate the whole herd by reusing one needle and the way we go! As Jackie Gleason would say.