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An Easter Warning

As Easter is approaching we will be enjoying the treats and flower that this encompasses however dogs and cats can become very ill if they ingest or come into contact with certain things.

Chocolate

During Easter we all enjoy eating some (a lot of) chocolate. Whilst for us it is a delectable treat, for dogs (and cats) if ingested, can cause life threatening illness. Chocolate contains theobromine that at toxic levels can cause vomiting, diarrhoea and shaking and can lead onto seizures (fits), heart issues and ultimately death. If you suspect your dog has consumed chocolate please ring the practice immediately as if treated early can reduce the risk to your dog.

Hot Cross Buns (raisins)

Raisins within hot cross buns can cause irreversible kidney failure and sadly death if consumed by dogs. Toxic doses vary and a very small amount can be deadly. If your dog has or even is suspected to have ingested raisins or grapes immediate veterinary treatment is indicated.

Bulbs

Easter is a time when spring emerges and our gardens and hedgerows are bright with colour from flowers. Certain flowers for example daffodils and hyacinths originate from bulbs buried in the ground. Dogs, especially puppies may be dig them up and may chew and ingest them. Toxicities can vary but usual signs of vomiting and diarrhoea are common. Veterinary intervention may be indicated so please contact the practice if you have any concerns.

Lilies

Lilies are highly toxic and extremely dangerous for cats and will cause kidney failure and sadly death. All parts of the lily is toxic i.e. stem, flower and pollen. The most common route of ingestion if through the pollen whilst grooming. Our advice would be to NEVER have lilies in a house where cats are present.

Anti-freeze

As the weather warms and people get out and about into their gardens and garages, cats have access to areas where chemicals such as antifreeze are stored. Antifreeze is sweet and is sadly enticing to cats which if consumed causes irreversible kidney failure. As cats are outdoor animals it can be hard to stop this however owners can alert unaware neighbours to keep chemicals such as antifreeze locked away from prying paws.

Conker poisoning in dogs

Conkers (seeds/nuts of the horse chestnut tree), may be synonymous with autumn but did you know that they can pose a serious risk to your dog if ingested.

Conkers contain a poison called aesculin which is toxic to dogs. A dog would normally need to ingest several conkers to suffer severe poisoning.

Clinical signs are usually seen between one and six hours after ingestion, although they can be delayed for up to two days.

Symptoms of conker poisoning include:

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  • Vomiting, which may contain blood
  • Diarrhoea
  • Drooling
  • Abdominal pain
  • Increased thirst and reduced appetite.
  • Signs of restlessness, wobbliness and muscle tremors may also be seen.

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Poisoning is not the only risk – these large nuts could cause a blockage in your dog’s intestines.

Although fatalities in cases where dogs have consumed conkers are thankfully rare, it is still very serious, so if you suspect your dog has ingested conkers, please contact your vet immediately.
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If necessary, the vet will give the dog medication to make them vomit and they may also perform gastric lavage (wash out the stomach).  This is designed to ensure as much of the poison is removed from the dog’s system as possible.

Although dogs love to forage when they’re out exploring, do keep a watchful eye on them when they’re around conkers.

Keeping your horse safe on Bonfire Night

Bonfire Night can be stressful for both horses and horse owners.

The calmest of horses can become frightened by the unfamiliar loud noises and flashes of bright light.

There are some things you can do to prepare….

  • Find out when and where the firework displays will be in your area. You could look in local press, social media and shop notice boards.
  • Inform local firework display organisers and neighbours that there are horses nearby, so they can ensure fireworks are set off well away from them.
  • Decide whether to stable your horse or leave it in the field. Horses like routine, so try and keep as close to your usual routine as possible. If it is usually stabled, keep it stabled. If it is normally out in the field, keep it there as long as it is safe, secure and not close to the firework display area.
  • Check for anything that could cause injury to your horse:
    – If stabled, look for things such as protruding nails.
    – If your horse is to stay in the field, check that fencing is not broken and that there are no foreign objects lying around.
  • Ensure that you, or someone experienced, stays with your horse if you know that fireworks are being set off.
    If you have to leave your horse in the care of another person during a firework display, then be sure to leave clear instructions with contact details for both you and your vet.
  • Discuss with your vet about sedation or perhaps consider moving your horse for the night.
  • Playing music on a radio positioned outside the stable can often mask sudden noise, distract attention and be soothing.
  • Stay calm, as horses will sense that you are anxious and that could increase their fears.
  • A startled horse can be dangerous, so try not to get in the way if a horse becomes frightened as you could easily be injured yourself.
  • Remember that Chinese lanterns (also known as sky lanterns) can cause harm to livestock and wildlife.

If you wish to discuss concerns about your horse with us, please call 01772 861300

Sneaky peek at our new small animal facilities?

Join us for a behind-the-scenes look at the brand new small animal facilities at our Goosnargh branch on:

Sunday 13th October 2019
1pm – 4pm

at Oakhill Veterinary Centre, Langley Lane, Goosnargh, PR3 2JQ

  • Practice tours 
  • See behind the scenes at your local vets
  • Meet the team
  • Refreshments
  • Demonstrations
  • Children’s activities

PLUS there’ll be a FREE PRIZE DRAW to be in with a chance of winning a Chocolate Hamper!

We hope you can join us!

Can we fight resistance?

Can we fight resistance? Responsible equine worming.

The approach to worming of the general horse population has changed significantly over the years. Unfortunately there are no new worming products in the pipeline and resistance to the current wormers is becoming more and more of an issue. 

Testing to identify those horses (approximately 30%) that carry a worm burden significant enough to warrant worming is taking over from the ‘blind worming’ approach that we have previously taken. 

In this ‘test before you treat’ approach, the positive tested horses then need to be wormed with the correct product, dependent upon the time of year. Ensuring you are administering the correct dose for the horse’s weight is really important as well because underdosing contributes to resistance.

The basic life cycle of an equine roundworm is shown in the picture below. 

roundworm cycle

Stage 1:  Eggs shed onto pasture develop, under the right conditions, into larvae. 

Stage 2:  Larvae are then eaten by the horse on grass where they enter the large intestine. These larvae mature to produce eggs. 

Stage 3: Eggs are passed out in faeces, back to Stage 1.

Our new Equine Worm Control Plan is now available! 
This year’s Oakhill Worm Control Plan is a bit different from previous years to avoid over-worming. It consists of an Equest wormer, 3 faecal egg counts spread over the year and a tapeworm saliva test kit. 

If any of the tests come back positive, the appropriate wormer will be sent out for no extra charge, including the tapeworm-only praziquantel wormer that is no longer available from shops/online. 

Click here for further information about the Oakhill Worm Control Plan.

 

Mike’s trip to Barcelona dairy farms

“I was lucky enough to be invited on a HIPRA trip to Spain recently to look at their vaccine manufacturing facility near Barcelona. As part of the trip, we also visited one of the local dairy farms and had an interesting insight into dairying in this part of Spain.”

Catalonia is situated in the north-west of Spain and is a region associated more with vineyards than dairy farms!

By Spanish standards the region is warm with moderate rainfall but it felt like our summer when I was there at the beginning of April.

The farm we visited is a member of a local cooperative supplying milk to both liquid and cheese producing markets. The current milk price was 32 cents per litre (28 ppl) but the farm is in the process of organic conversion – the organic price is currently 60 cents per litre (52 ppl)!

There were 210 cows on the unit, being milked twice daily and averaging 34 L / cow / day. The cows are housed all year round and fed a mixture of zero grazed grass, maize, grass silage and lucerne – bought in feed was minimal but did include a soya blend. The move to organic is going to mean the cows will be grazed at least 2 hours every day.

The milkers were cubicle housed on straw bedding and fed a TMR once daily – there were no OOP feeders or in parlour feeding. There were 2 cow groups based on days in milk and a separate milking heifer group. Dry cows and in calf heifers were on loose bedding and fed a dry cow TMR.

Mastitis rates were low although the farm has started to vaccinate against mastitis as environmental e-coli type mastitis has been an issue in the past. The farmer now performs on-farm milk culturing of mastitis cases and no longer treats certain types of mastitis with antibiotics.

The aim is to calve heifers at 24 months and the farm is now using a mix of sexed Holstein semen and Aberdeen Angus semen across the herd. The market for Holstein bull calves continues to shrink.

Heat stress is a major issue in this region and the farm has recently installed a sprinkler system alongside fans to try and combat this. Fertility is a huge challenge during the summer and the annual number of services per conception is 2.7; worse in summer. The farm was on weekly vet visits and synch programs are used to drive submission rates.

The farm is now using automated body condition scoring technology to monitor individual cow performance – this helps identify individual problem cows but also helps to highlight trends across groups of cows.

On the vet side of things there were some interesting differences between Spain and the UK. The farmer’s vet is not allowed to sell prescription meds – instead they issue prescriptions to the farmer who buys them through a local pharmacy. The veterinary services are paid on a set monthly contract, this includes fertility work, herd health planning and call outs. The farm also uses a vet for herd nutrition and an external veterinary consultant for milk quality.

There is a strong focus on profitability, including annual costings and benchmarking all farms within the co-op.

Alongside this, the farm tries to engage with the local community and consumers by encouraging school visits and having regular open days on weekends.

Mike

Border Disease

Border disease or hairy shaker disease is a virus which causes birth defects, barren ewes and abortion. It is from the same family of viruses as BVD in cattle.

If a ewe is infected during pregnancy the virus passes through the placenta to the lamb, in some cases this causes embryonic loss or abortion. Some lambs survive and are born Persistently infected (PI). PIs shed the virus continuously and can infect other sheep and lambs. This can be a major problem in naïve flocks unknowingly buying in PIs which can then cause around half of lambs born to be affected by the disease.

 

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  • Infection in non-pregnant adult sheep is generally short lived and mild, often no clinical signs are seen.
  • Hairy shakers are lambs infected with the virus whilst developing in-utero effecting their nervous system which leads to trembling and incoordination. They also have long curly wool.
  • Some lambs are born completely normal but maintain the infection, these are called Persistently Infected animals (PI).

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Hairy shakers are usually a good way to diagnose the presence of the disease. These lambs can also be blood tested to confirm presence of the virus.

Blood testing a group of ewes can identify if the flock has been exposed to the disease and is likely to be present.

To discuss with our Farm Team further, please contact us

 

Winter series: Impactions

Colic is a collection of clinical signs shown by a horse indicating abdominal discomfort. We see an increase in colic’s due to impactions during the winter months.

Impactions of the gastro intestinal tract commonly occur at the pelvic flexure. The pelvic flexure is a part of the large colon which turns 180 degrees on itself and naturally narrows. The reduced speed of food material passing through this area mean it is more susceptible than other areas to blockage.

Other than anatomy there are a number of changes that occur, mostly in the winter, which increase the risk of blockage:

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  • We reduce the amount of hours that horses and ponies are outside eating short moist grass and replace it with eating longer, drier roughage such as hay and haylage. Larger amounts of hay and haylage can be eaten alot quicker.
  • Horses and ponies often have less exercise either because they are confined to a stable for longer periods of the day or because we can’t ride them as much due to shorter daylight hours.
  • Horses may reduce their winter intake due to the water being cold or frozen, causing the food material to become dehydrated in the gut.
  • Horses may be turned out on sand paddocks to stretch their legs. If roughage is fed from the floor then they will ingest sand particles which will rest in the gut.
  • Horses and ponies may eat large amounts of straw from their bedding.

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As food material slows down in the pelvic flexure more water is reabsorbed from the gut causing drying of the gut contents, reducing motility of the gut further, leading to more drying and eventual blockage. Usually the horse will have passed reduced amount of, drier than normal, faeces over the preceeding 48-72 hours to eventually passing no droppings at all.

Pain from impaction colics is due to stretch of the gut.  Impaction colics usually are mild in pain but can have periodic episodes of more intense pain. Normal colic signs such as pawing, flank watching and inappetance can be exhibited.

Examination by a vet may reveal a mildly increased heart rate, dry gums and prolonged skin tent. Gut sounds can sometimes be reduced due to slowing of the gut, however they can also be increased as the body’s response to try to shift the blockage. Impactions of the pelvic flexure can usually be identified on rectal examination. They usually are doughy in consistency and sit in the lower left area of the abdomen.

Treatment, as with any colic, involves providing pain relief and a muscle relaxant. In addition the blocked food material needs to be rehydrated. This is most commonly done using a tube passed down the nostril of the horse into the stomach. A mix of water and electrolytes is then administered. Over time this will seep through the food and hopefully relieve the blockage. Food is restricted until poo is seen as it will contribute to the blockage. Tubing may have to occur repeatedly over several days. In severe cases intra venous fluids may need to be used.

So to prevent your horse or pony from becoming impacted this winter try to:

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  • Change diet slowly.
  • Avoid straw bedding if you are concerned your horse or pony eats it.
  • Try to keep exercise maintained, a walk around the yard is better than standing still in a stable.
  • Ensure a ready access to fresh water.

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It is worth noting that there are other causes of impactions such as ileo-caecal impactions due to tapeworms and ascarid impaction of the small intestine in youngsters and these will be discussed at a later date.

 

As always, if you are concerned about colic in your horse, please call us on 01772 861300

 

HEAT STRESS IN DOGS

Overheating and heat stress can be a killer so here are some tips to help your dog have a happy and healthy summer.

 

SYMPTOMS:

  • Panting excessively
  • Drooling
  • Increase in heart rate
  • Reddened/purple gums
  • Vomiting and Diarrhoea
  • Seizures progressing to coma and even death.

TREATMENT:

As soon as possible move your pet to a cooler spot, keep them as quiet and calm as possible. Use wet cool towels to gradually lower the temperature and use a fan if possible. Contact your vet as soon as possible as serious complications may result.

 


PREVENTION:

  • Exercise your dog early morning/late evening to avoid the midday sun.
  • Ensure access to shade in the garden you could even supply a paddling pool!
  • Have fresh cool water available, put ice -cubes in the water if taking some out with you.
  • Be extra careful with either very young or old, overweight or longhaired animals. Some breeds are more likely to suffer including short-nosed breeds such as boxers and pugs etc.
  • NEVER leave your pet in a parked car even on overcast days the temperature can increase dramatically.
  • Clip longhaired breeds.
  • Use a fan in the rooms where you pet likes to settle.