Poor Thrift Flashcards
What is poor thrift?
- failrue to acheive target weight gain at a certain age
OR - very low BCS
When are most thrift problems identified?
Slaughter time - most farmers do not routinely weigh
Why is poor thrift important in young animals?
Even small ^ weight gain can be economically important in herds of large number
Why is poor thrift in adults a problem?
> economic cost if thin at key times of year eg.
- mating: ^ anaeostrus length, v concenption, v ovulation
- early preg: v placental development
- late preg ^ metabolic disease
- lactation: v milk production
welfare
What are the 2 methods of assessing thrift in adults and how effective are they?
- weighing - also affected by age, breeed, gut fill, stage of production cycle
- BCS - cattle, sheep, goats, alpaca, 1-5 scale
horses and cattle sometimes 1-9 scale
What is the logical approach to assessing weight loss in a herd setting?
- Whole group affected or only some?
- Appetite normal?
- (if yes => a) Nutrition adequate?
- (if no => b) Cant wat/wont eat?
4a. (if yes) maldigestion, malabsorption eg. parasitism, johnes, tumours
4a. (if no) underfeeding or trace element deficiency
4b. cant eat - dental disease or lamenss
4b. wont eat - parasitism
What is the main cause of poor thrift in the whole herd? (± normal apetitie and adequate nutrition)
Maldigestion or malaabsorption due to parasitism
- nemotodes, liver flukes or coccidiosis
What is the main cause of poor thrift in a few animals (normal appetite, adequate nutiriton)
- johnes
- tumours
- chronic disease eg. pnumonia
What 2 forms of under feeding may be occouring?
- Amount and quality
2. Trace element deficiency (grazing aniamls rely on soil/plant levels, usually whole group affected)
What is the most common cause of whole herd “wont eat” weight loss in grazing animals? What is the problem with this?
GI parasitism - nematodes
> appetitie resuctino usually not noticed by farmer!
What is the most common causes when a few individuals “cant eat” ?
- Dental disease (usually only adults)
- lameness
How can poor thrift be defined?
- numbers eg. weight loss daily, time to slaughter
- age/groups affected
- no. animals affected
- severity
How can poor thrift problem be refined?
- whole group/subgroup
- nutirtion adequate?
What is the problem of older sheep losing incisors termed?
Broken mouth
What aspects of the history are important when looking at poor thrift?
- farming system, feed management
- time of calving/lambing and weaning
- reproductive rate and spread
- worming regime and anthelmintics
- previous TE problems, supplements
- observations of clinical signs
What should be assessed in the “environment examinatioin”?
Pasture and feed availabitily across farm
What can be assessed from the distance examination?
- variation in size and weight
- scouring
- lamenss
- coughing
- pruritits
What aspects of the physical exam can be undertaken quickly when getting thorugh a large group of animals>
weight, BCS, MMs
When may PME be useful? What can be looked at?
- Large no.s affected, low individual calue eg. sheep
- chronic cases shoing no improvement
-> eutahanise severely affected - check with VLA first
> collect liver for TE analysis
> liver fluke
> GIT worms
> lungs resp disease
What sheep GIT worms can be seen with the naked eye?
Heamonchus
Ostertagia
Trichostrongylus
What other tests may be performed? What should be considered when advocating these tests?
> sample size and which animals to test? ]
- FEC
- Liver/blood - TE analysis
- ± feed analysis
Are there often multiple factors affecting poor thrift in a group?
YES! Try to assess relative importance of each.
