TOP FARMING ADVICE

LIVESTOCK

TREATING LIVESTOCK AGAINST DISEASE IN WINTER

LIVER FLUKE

A parasite that causes problems, but cannot be seen, is the liver fluke. Its distribution depends on rainfall and the availability of open water sources. In very wet years cases of liver fluke can increase dramatically. Although cattle are more resilient than sheep, neither develops a good resistance to this parasite.

In South Africa, if there is high rainfall in spring and summer, conditions probably become optimal for heavy infestations of fluke in autumn. Animals get infested when they graze wet areas like wetlands of the edge of water pans. Immature flukes are ingested with the grazing and work their way through the intestines to the abdomen and then to the liver.

For the next two months they tunnel through the liver eating the tissue and growing into adults. The signs of the disease will depend on the number of infective flukes. In the first two months the animals will rapidly lose weight,