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Screensize: 640 x 480 800 x 600 1024 x 768 1280 x 1024 Format Mode: Basic  Help  Prompt  Format: Font Andale Mono Arial Arial Black Book Antiqua Century Gothic Comic Sans MS Courier New Georgia Impact Lucida Console Script MT Bold Stencil Tahoma Times New Roman Trebuchet MS Verdana   Size 1 2 3 4 5 6   Color Black Red Yellow Pink Green Orange Purple Blue Beige Brown Teal Navy Maroon LimeGreen Message: * HTML is OFF * Forum Code is ON Smilies [quote][i]Originally posted by NellieBelle[/i] [br]Have been extremely busy with my herd and pink eye. Swept through here like wildfire. It made me feel like I let my cow gals and steers down. Vet reassured me that that wasn't the case. Yes I can try and manage the flies, (which are horrible this year). But he said fences don't stop flies and they probably came from a beef herd nearby. Doesn't change the fact that all my cows, calves and steers contacted pink eye. All the cows and calves have been treated by the vet. My steers I did the best I could as they were not captured to be treated. I just treated from a distance. They appear to be healing on their own. I kept Nellie, Darla and the calves in the barn several days in a row as sunlight exacerbates the problem and so this made more clean up and work throughout the days. I wouldn't wish this on any creature. Time will tell if their eyes were damaged. I do have the Fly Predator in use, however that takes some time, but hopeful it will help in the future. Didn't see this one coming. Info to follow: Next Post > Jul 29, 2014 Giving Pink Eye the Stink EyepetMD Logo by Dr. Anna O'Brien With summer in full swing comes the usual veterinary problems in a large animal clinic: lacerations on horse legs, over-heated alpacas, warts on show calves, hoof rot in sheep, and a lot of pink eye in beef cattle. Let’s take a closer look at this common ophthalmologic issue in cows. Pink eye in cattle, medically known as infectious bovine keratoconjunctivitis, is a contagious bacterial infection of the eye. Cattle pink eye is different from human pink eye, which, although usually infectious, is not highly contagious. Pink eye in cattle also looks clinically different and is usually much more severe than the disease in humans. Pink eye in cattle is most commonly caused by a bacterium called Moraxella bovis. This crafty microbe uses tiny hair like structures called pili to attach to the white part, or the conjunctiva, of the eye and cause damage. M. bovis is spread by flies, which feed on eye secretions and are a constant source of irritation to cattle in the summer months, providing the perfect recipe for eyeball infection. Once introduced to the eye, M. bovis causes irritation and tearing. The first clinical sign of pink eye infection in cattle is an animal squinting. Very soon after initial infection, the cornea begins to cloud up and soon becomes completely white. An ulcer will form on the cornea and if not treated, can result in permanent blindness. Sometimes the damage to the eye is so severe, the eye itself will protrude from the socket. Pink eye most commonly affects beef calves and in some herds can greatly affect productivity. The eye pain and subsequent stress that pink eye causes can result in profound weight loss, or lack of weigh gain, in beef calves, which is obviously a cause for concern for the farmer. For the health and well-being of the animal and the farmer’s bottom line, pink eye should be treated as quickly as possible. One of the best ways to treat pink eye in cattle is a subconjunctival injection of antibiotics to kill the infection and steroids to help with the inflammation. This is where a steady hand, proper head restraint, and a non-queasy stomach really come in handy because subconjunctival means an injection directly into the white part (conjunctiva) of the eye. With the animal’s head held completely still in a chute, a needle is inserted just under the conjunctiva. The mix of antibiotics and steroid is then slowly and carefully injected so that a small bleb of medicine appears. Yes, this hurts the animal initially, but it works wonders. Many pink eye cases respond within a day or so. Sometimes an intramuscular injection of antibiotics (often oxytetracycline) can also be used. I do this if the farm lacks proper facilities to restrain the animal for an eyeball poke (that’s a medical term, by the way). If treated promptly, the cornea will clear up and sight will return. If corneal ulceration was severe, sometimes a small scar will remain on the eyeball. Cattle usually get pink eye only in one eye. If both eyes are infected, sometimes a calf will have to be penned to allow healing and sight to return. Prevention is always better than the cure itself, and proper fly control is really the best way to go to keep pink eye from ravaging through a herd. Sometimes this is difficult, however, and other times it just seems like a farm has a really hot strain of M. bovis. Younger calves can be vaccinated against multiple strains of M. bovis and we recommend this if a particular farm has had issues in the past. Between vaccinations, fly control, and a good ol’ eyeball jab, we give the stink eye to pink eye in the summertime. Dr. Anna O'Brien Image: Ruud Morijn Photographer / S [/quote]   Check here to include your profile signature. Check here to subscribe to this topic.