Herouldmede Gaymaid 10th (Fern)
On a cold frosty morning in February 2020 we entered the shed to check on the cattle only to find Fern on her side, dead. It was a huge shock, made even more tragic as she was just two weeks off calving. Now in this world you have to get used to stock dying, but still she was only four years old and seemingly in good health. We check the cattle at least three times a day, especially as they get close to calving and the night before she had been just her usual self keen for a scratch and a bit of affection.
With no visible signs of stress - there were no scuff marks around her feet to show that she's been either fitting or trying to get up in any way - our only conclusion was that she'd had a very sudden and certainly unexplained death. Therefore the only course open to us was to have an autopsy to try and determine what had gone wrong. Not only to find the reason, but to be sure it was nothing that might affect the rest of the herd - once you know the cause you can keep an eye on the others just in case there might be tale tale signs to watch out for.
Sarah Watson from Belmont Farm and Equine Vets Ltd in Bromyard was with us by the afternoon to do the procedure. Our first finding was that the uterus was twisted - even if there was nothing else wrong that in itself could well have proved fatal at the time of calving, but as we went further there were other signs of things not being quite right. Both her rumen and omasum stomachs were particularly full with the fodder in the omasum being very hard and dry - and strangely there was very little in her intestines. Her kidneys were fine but her liver didn't look quite right, with rounded edges, instead of sharp and a particularly odd colour in places, but when cut into didn't look overly unusual. When we got to her lungs Sarah immediately pointed out that there really should not be any grey 'stripes' in it, and when we investigated further there was quite a bit of 'foam' in them, but Sarah said that could be post-mortem. Her heart was strong with nothing particular to comment on, so we took samples of those suspect organs, along with a few fluids and Sarah sent them off for analysis... we'll update this page once the results are back.
*** FINAL UPDATE ***
We have now had the results back from all the tests and it seems that she died of 'Pasteurellosis' which is normally associated with stress and is usually known as 'Transit Fever' as it's most common in young stock that have been recently weaned and stressed from being moved onto new premises. It is a pathogen found in the upper respiratory tract in all cattle but doesn't cause harm until stimulated into over production by stress causing breathing problems and most often death. If caught in time it can be treated with antibiotics. Fern had never left the farm, was a quiet gentle cow and like all the others had been in the shed since the end of November - so that really couldn't have been the cause. We believe that there's a strong possibility that something to do with the calf was the trigger - it really was one of the biggest bull calves we have ever seen and as she was only a second calver that might well have contributed to the problem. We don't know. All we do know is that she was a lovely girl and we miss her.
We have now had the results back from all the tests and it seems that she died of 'Pasteurellosis' which is normally associated with stress and is usually known as 'Transit Fever' as it's most common in young stock that have been recently weaned and stressed from being moved onto new premises. It is a pathogen found in the upper respiratory tract in all cattle but doesn't cause harm until stimulated into over production by stress causing breathing problems and most often death. If caught in time it can be treated with antibiotics. Fern had never left the farm, was a quiet gentle cow and like all the others had been in the shed since the end of November - so that really couldn't have been the cause. We believe that there's a strong possibility that something to do with the calf was the trigger - it really was one of the biggest bull calves we have ever seen and as she was only a second calver that might well have contributed to the problem. We don't know. All we do know is that she was a lovely girl and we miss her.