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A lame cow is a cow in pain

A lame cow eats less, which means she then produces less, and she’ll be more likely to struggle getting in calf. Good prevention and early action when you do have a case saves you time and money, and improves animal welfare. Let’s take a look at the causes of hoof pain, treatment guidelines for this type of lameness, and strategies to minimise its occurrence. ...

The benefits of heat detecting before mating

Pre-mating heat detection has several benefits – and they make up for the amount of tail paint used!By observing and recording your cows’ heats before the start of mating, you can make more informed decisions that ultimately improve herd reproductive performance, farm profitability, and long-term sustainability.Here’s how:...

Preparing for reproduction

There are a lot of ways to try to optimise your cows getting back in-calf as quickly as possible. Firstly, make sure your herd is on a rising plane of nutrition. For a nutritional consultation, get in touch with us. Make the most of our vet Marjan, who is a registered nutritionist, before she leaves for her new role! Then look into their trace elements levels, especially copper, magnesium, selenium, and iodine. We can take some blood and liver samples for testing to see if they are def...

Trace elements: Are your results normal?

Our advice as vets is to check your stock’s trace element levels before mating, even if your mineral supplementation hasn’t changed or you tested cull cows at dry off. Unfortunately each season is different and results can change. This season, for example, has been very abnormal...We had cull cows which were very high in some minerals, but then the levels in bloods taken from cows on-farm were low (so the cows tested at the works were NOT the ones from this farm)! We experienced un...

Keeping your pets safe and calm during fireworks

Fireworks can be a beautiful sight, but they can also be stressful for our pets. Here are some simple, practical tips to help keep your animals safe, comfortable, and calm as possible during firework displays.  ...

Understanding ear infections in dogs 

The most frequent type of ear infection canines experience is called otitis externa, which simply means inflammation of the outer ear canal. While dogs with floppy or hairy ears (think cocker spaniels and poodles) are more likely to be affected, it can happen to any dog.  ...

Why is my pet so itchy?

Itching, also called pruritus, is a sensation that makes your dog or cat want to scratch, rub, lick, or chew their skin. While occasional scratching can be normal, persistent or severe itching often signals an underlying issue that needs attention.  ...

When the proverbial hits the fan: Calves with scours

As a great farmer – and we know you are – your colostrum management is ideal, with quality (>22 measured on a Brix refractometer), quantity (4-6 litres), quickly (fed within 12 hours of birth), quantified (regular assessment of IgG levels), and squeaky clean!   But out of the blue, you find you have calves with diarrhoea. The cause may be nutritional or infectious. Discovering what type you are dealing with can reduce cost, time, illness and potential deaths.Nutritional dia...

When to step in and assist a calving

Assist cows if there’s no progress within 30 minutes of the waterbag showing.Assist heifers if there’s no progress within one hour of the waterbag showing.OR assist if you see:Only one leg.Only the head.A back foot or the tail (indicating it’s backwards).No feet after active straining.The cow appears tired or distressed.If unsure, call your vet. The longer you wait, the more chance of a stillbirth or injury – and your vet is here for these exact situations....

Mastitis in dry cows

Did you struggle with mastitis cases amongst your non-lactating cows this winter?Here are a few tips to help keep your herd healthy during the dry period:   Keep cows that have been dried off away from the milking shed for 10-14 days. Movement near this area can cause them to let their milk down.Keep them off wet, muddy paddocks if possible, especially in those first few days post dry-off.Keep them calm, and move them slowly to new paddocks so they don’t kick up muck.After two w...

Are lice a problem on your farm?

As we head into the colder months on the West Coast, lice infestations can become an increasing concern. While common across New Zealand, the West Coast’s unique climate – cool, moist, and often wet – creates ideal conditions for lice to thrive....

Down cow prevention

“Down cows? That’s something that I don’t need to worry about happening until spring...” you might be thinking, but now is the time to start planning how to prevent the impacts of those down cows.  Not only will there be many costs and potential losses, cows who go down with milk fever also have a higher chance of having metritis, mastitis, and reproductive issues going forward. So, if you treated more than 2% of your herd for milk fever last spring, or you just want to have less pr...

Rounding up repro results

Thank you to everyone who came along to our Repro Round Up dinner and discussion.It was an enjoyable evening with fantastic food, cheerful company, and some striking stats. There was great interaction throughout the presentation, and the audience asked some really insightful questions. Overall, it was a poorer season on-farm from a reproductive standpoint, with a median empty rate of 12% (compared to 10% last season) and a six week in calf rate average of 66% (compared to 69% last season). ...

Protect your future herd

Teat sealing has become an increasingly popular and effective method to reduce the risk of clinical and subclinical mastitis in heifers. Heifers are particularly vulnerable to mastitis before they even enter the milking herd. Studies show that up to 50% of heifers may already have a teat infection at calving, often caused by environmental bacteria like Streptococcus uberis. These early infections can impact future milk production and increase somatic cell counts, affecting both animal welfa...

Preparing them for dry-off: Multimin Evolution

Zinc and manganese are two essential microminerals for dairy cows and calves. Animals deficient in these trace elements can have problems with health and immunity, making them more susceptible to disease.  Zinc is often associated with the prevention of facial eczema, but it’s also very important outside the eczema season for growth, production, reproduction, and hoof health. Because most feeds contain at least a marginally adequate level of manganese, we don’t often see clini...

Can you vaccinate against mastitis?

Both clinical and subclinical mastitis impact animal welfare, have significant costs, and lower sustainability. There are now two vaccines available to help boost cow immunity to mastitis, with the aim of reducing the usage of antibiotics and the amount of milk down the drain. The UBAC® vaccine targets Gram-positive bacteria, including Streptococcus uberis. It was introduced to the New Zealand market in 2024. Streptococcus uberis is the predominant cause of mastitis on New Zealand dai...

An AB tech’s wishlist

The major reason why AB technicians are not allowed to work in herringbone pits anymore is health and safety. The risks include: trip/fall hazards (vertical bars and concrete don’t have any give, bones do!) and machinery dangers (someone can be scalped if the plant is still running!)....

What the FEC?

FEC (faecal egg count) testing is the method for determining the number of internal parasite eggs in a poo sample. We use FECs to assess the burden of roundworms in a cattle herd and to determine if deworming, otherwise known as drenching, is needed.A few months ago West Coast Vets acquired a Parasight machine that allows us to do a FEC in-clinic in just a few minutes. We have previously had to send samples away to Christchurch, or spend a long time preparing and then manually counting the sampl...

Autumn parasites: Liver fluke & Ostertagia

Liver fluke is a parasite that is pretty common on the West Coast. The life cycle of the parasite (properly called Fasciola Hepatica) is slightly different from other parasites as it involves a small snail as a host. The adult fluke ‘graze’ on the lining of cattle and sheep bile ducts and livers, creating an inflammatory reaction and scarring. This results in protein loss and anaemia, which can cause chronic wasting.Fluke snails live in areas with reasonably clean, slow-moving water sou...

High cell count cows

This season has been a challenging one, starting out so wet and then really drying up from Boxing Day. One issue that is occurring on quite a few farms this season is elevated cell counts and an increase in clinical mastitis. If this is happening to you, you're not alone. Here are a few ideas to help as milking winds down:...

Copper and selenium in calves

We talk about trace elements a lot for your dairy cows, but sometimes youngstock can be forgotten about!When trace element status is in the optimal range, it gives animals the best chance at fighting off other diseases and parasites. Along with excellent nutrition, trace elements like copper and selenium should be at the top of your mind for ensuring the ideal growth and health of your youngstock....

It's scanning season

Aged pregnancy diagnosis (scanning) allows for clearer expectations and better management in spring, as you will accurately know when cows will be due to calve. Scanning also allows the mating season to be evaluated through conception rates, which may influence how you look to improve in the future. We age scan by measuring biometrics of the foetus, either body length, trunk diameter or head length. Based on how long these are we calculate the equivalent days. To accurately age a pregn...

Out of sight, out of mind: Facial Eczema

It can be hard trying to focus on what we don’t see! For every clinical case of facial eczema (FE) there are 10 subclinical cases.FE is caused by a fungus, pithomyces chartarum, which grows on dead pasture litter. In late summer and autumn, when periods of warm humid weather are common, the fungus can multiply rapidly producing large numbers of spores which contain a toxin called sporidesmin.  When livestock ingest pasture with high spore loads, the toxin can cause severe liver damage and...

Summer is here! But do cows like warm weather?

When summer arrives, we finally find ourselves taking those extra layers off and our bodies are enjoying warming up. But what about cows? They cannot take a layer off and often have a black coat... Cows feel hot sooner than we do. Dairy cows need to maintain a constant body temperature of around 38-39°C. They are sensitive to any factor which influences the thermal exchange with the environment – like air temperature, wind, and humidity. When an animal’s heat load is greater than ...

Careful with pets and Christmas treats

Christmas treats are something we all look forward to, but for our furry friends, some of these can be extremely toxic, so it is important to keep them out of reach. If you have a pet with a penchant for opening gifts, this may mean not putting wrapped treats under the tree!Some festive foods to be cautious of around pets include:1. ChocolateWhy it's toxic: Chocolate contains theobromine and caffeine, which are stimulants of the central nervous system and heart. They also act as diuretics, which...