43 It’s Farming. And It’s Better. Better Farming | August 2024 susceptible to disease.” The risk level of these movements is dependent on the individual farm. Poultry farms may be more likely to have trucks hauling in feed to their barns, but also may not have the same challenges with groups of naive animals as beef producers during calving season. Some beef and dairy herds may also avoid buying in replacements, whereas some may rely on other farmers for new genetics. “No operation is 100 per cent closed and producers should assess the unique risk on their own operation,” says Cross. For livestock that can be managed in smaller groups, there are steps that can be taken to avoid disease transmission between animals on the farm. “In the VBP Plus producer manual, we recommend working on the principle of moving from the cleanest to dirtiest jobs. Do jobs like feeding while moving from the healthiest cattle to sick cattle, and from the most vulnerable calves to the older cattle that might be shedding more disease,” says Cross. “Clean and disinfect equipment when you restart the task, but moving from clean to dirty means you aren’t stopping to clean between every job, and you are also not spreading disease.” She also recommends isolating sick animals and those being bought in when possible. Purchased cattle should preferably come from healthy herds. “Ideally, the gold standard is that before buying, producers would seek out herds with good herd health, and would look at the animals to make sure they look healthy,” says Cross. Schlegel suggests a similar approach with poultry. “Farmers should ask what the health status is of the birds or chicks or pullets they are buying in. They need to have that conversation with the hatchery or the other farmers. Try to avoid bringing anything into your operation that you don’t already have,” explains Schlegel. Cross adds, “If you’re purchasing animals from a herd not up to your health standard, work to get them there with vaccines and segregate them for 14 days. Facilities should be away from the main herd and accessible without going through the rest of the herd. If you have to walk through the whole herd to get to and from the new animals, you open up that avenue for transmission.” Good record-keeping can also be a beneficial biosecurity measure. “It shows trends in your herd where disease might be occurring,” says Cross. “If you track treatments, you can look back and see if disease is occurring in a particular pen or group of cattle. That allows you to make a judgement on what might be the cause and prevent the problem in the future.” A good record system should also be used to keep track of visitors to the farm. Managing visitors Visitors can be quite common on livestock farms, with feed deliveries, veterinarians, other farmers, and sup- port teams coming and going as needed. But many of these people will also visit other livestock farms and could be unintentionally carrying diseases. Different livestock sectors have slight variations on control and restricted zones on their farms, but the general principle can be applied to any operation. “Controlled areas or zones have controlled points of access that we can monitor but allow for traffic flow, such as a gate to the farm or a pasture,” says Cross. “Restricted zones allow only certain people or objects to access that area, such as going into a barn where only employees are allowed in.” Schlegel says for a poultry flock, this might look more like the barn Livestock Feed your most vulnerable calves first to reduce disease transmission. Emily Croft photo
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