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Pre-Rut Weaning

Research has shown that management decisions around the time of weaning can have a huge effect on the profitability of your farm. In the wild, fawns won’t wean themselves until they are at least 7 months old. This is not feasible within a farming system. Post-rut weaning is better suited for extensive hill country properties that have relatively low input. It is a great choice for maintaining fawn growth at the cost of reducing the conception rate in the hinds. Pre-rut weaning will reduce feed...

Sheep IQ – data from our part of the world

With enough hounding of the farmer and one of the founders, we now have our very own flock of VetSouth trial sheep! These girls are currently split into two mobs and will be separated further again shortly after being selected by our resident vets and epidemiologists. We have 200 two tooths, half of which will become a testing group and half a control group. There are also 300 hoggets that will be randomised and separated into different groups eventually. We're excited to have FarmIQ on board, a...

Working dogs: Poisons on farm

Dogs' sense of smell is noted to be 10000 times stronger than their human counterparts. While we are not sure if they differentiate between what smells “good” or just “interesting”, we do know they have a habit of sticking their nose in something that might cause them some harm. While your team of working dogs are around things that some other dogs would be around, it is worth noting that there are some dangers to your team on the farm. So what to look out for? While we have to keep our ...

Heifer health requirements: Grazing and feed

Vet Claire dives into your FAQs around feed to ensure the health of your herd....

Heifer health requirements: Parasite management, vaccinations and trace elements

Vet Claire dives into your FAQs around parasite management, trace elements and vaccinations for your youngstock. Motivational quotes from studies published 2019-2020: "Early calving heifers become early calving cows" "Heifers that were a greater proportion of their 21-month LWT at 12 months of age produced more first lactation and cumulative 3-year milk yields than heifers that were a lesser proportion of their 21-month LWT at 12 months of age. These results indicate that increased growth in the...

Meet our East Practice Manager: Hannah

One of our newest members over in the East is the wonderful Hannah! Hannah has taken on the position of Practice Manager for the East, which includes everything from Gore to Tapanui to Clydevale and Balclutha! As she is settling into her busy role, we took five minutes to catch up with her....

New calf-specific drenches available!

Vet Dan discusses the new options on the market for our youngstock. Giving your calves their first drench should have either happened already or be imminent now! There are some exciting new drenches that are relatively new to the market that have added benefits....

Preparation for scanning

Vet Claire and Tech Steph share their top tips for an easy scan. There’s a lot going on when heifers and cows are getting scanned. Numbers are getting thrown around all over the show: tag numbers, mating dates, days pregnant, the time the alarm went off to get on-farm and so on. Here’s a list of things worth quickly thinking about before it’s your turn to scan. Anything that can help the scanning job go as smoothly as possible on the day, will help reduce the risk of scanning or recording ...

Regular weighing of youngstock

Think it's extra work? We can do it when you have the animals in the yards for other health treatments. And with mobile scales, we can come to you. Data. Love it or hate it, it’s vital for knowing how your farm operates, how your animals are and areas you can improve. Regular weighing of your youngstock allows you to understand your animals at a crucial stage of their development. Calves are the future of every herd, achieving live weight gains and maintaining monthly targets are essential. Fo...

Scanning options with VetSouth

Scanning season is fast approaching for us vets, and just as it gets quieter on the dairy farm for you guys, we crack right into one of our busiest times of the year! In fact, we have already started doing our first aging scans for heifers! Many farmers are starting to age scan their heifers to work out which cows have held to AI if they ran a PG synchro or CIDR program. They can then easily identify who the AI replacement calves are, and potentially calve them down in a separate mob. It is als...

Summer diseases of young cattle

We have talked elsewhere about the impact, monitoring and treatment of issues with trace elements and parasites on our youngstock. So instead of covering more about those, this article is an overview of some more common diseases seen in weaned calves to keep an eye out for this summer....

VetSouth delivery FAQ

Everything you need to know about our on-farm delivery service! Sometimes you just don’t have enough time to get all the jobs done, let alone popping into town to pick up stuff for the farm. Our clinics have a delivery service, servicing the wider communities ensuring you get your products on-farm when you need them. We understand how hard getting into town can be when you are under the pump, which is why our delivery teams head out every day to help you get the products you need. We have been...

Covid-19: What does the traffic light system mean for vet clinics?

We are currently operating at Traffic Light Orange and committed to keeping all animals and communities healthy. We’re following the Ministry of Health’s recommendations and requirements. We respect your personal circumstances, so let us know if you have any specific needs. You are welcome in our shop, and we ask you to follow the usual requirements of wearing face masks, contact tracing, maintaining a distance of 1m from other people and limiting the numbers in store at any given time. In...

Sudden death in cows

Fast-growing young animals, and high performing adult cattle, especially those grazing redeveloped pasture, intensive feed systems (clover, chicory, or high sugar grasses), or switching to supplements or crops, are at high risk of being found dead, or sudden death syndrome. ...

Meet our West Practice Manager: Lis

I grew up in Dunedin and had a strong interest in agriculture. I studied a Bachelor of Agriscience and then worked on a farm. After that, I moved to Omarama to work for Vetlife. Moving to Marama for work also worked with my other passion - flying glider aeroplanes. I worked for Vetlife in the McKenzie Region for five and a half years then for another two years in their dairy consultancy business. We moved south to contract milk and began working for VetSouth in 2019 as the West Retail Lead. Thi...

Clostridial and B12 vaccinations

Put your hand up if, every year in late summer, you have a beautiful mob of lambs ready to go to the works, then you find one or more suddenly dead in the paddock a few days before the truck comes? This tends to be relatively common on sheep farms, and also in some beef mobs too. This sudden death syndrome in fat, fast-growing lambs is usually due to clostridial bacteria. It can also occur when lambs are on a high-octane summer crop. What can be done to prevent these deaths? Most sheep farmers ...

Triple drench resistance: Not just a North Island problem

Drench resistance is happening in the South. Vet Donna looks at how it can be managed. Every year we run some Faecal Egg Count Reduction Tests (FECRT) on our farms to see how well the drenches are performing. In the past, we have found that in many cases there is some level of resistance to the single active drenches. However, over the past few years, we have been finding more and more drench resistance to the drenches in double and now triple combinations in our patch – Otago and Southland!...

Twisted gut in working dogs

Large breed dogs with deep chests like our beloved Huntaways, are more susceptible to twisted guts. Gastric dilatation volvulus (GDV), often referred to as “a twisted gut” is a common, life-threatening condition in large, deep-chested dogs around the world. In NZ there is a high incidence of this condition in Huntaway working dogs. ...

What is Cheesy Gland?

Sounds a bit like cob loaf but I assure you, it's not quite as tasty. For a lot of farmers, this disease is unheard of; but this annoying bit of pus can be costing more than you think. What is Cheesy Gland? Cheesy Gland is a bacterial infection caused by Corynebacterium pseudotuberculosis. This bacterium causes abscesses in lymph nodes and internal organs, mainly the lungs. How do I know we have a Cheesy Gland problem on-farm? A problem may exist on farms when shearers report more abscesses than...

What is Salmonella Hindmarsh?

How to reduce risk to yourself and your animals. Enteric salmonellosis of sheep is a bacterial disease causing outbreaks of diarrhoea and death. Salmonella Hindmarsh is usually the cause, however Salmonella typhimurium, and bovis-morbificans can also cause issues. Most outbreaks occur between December and June, usually after a period of stress, such as transport, yarding, high stocking rates, or sudden changes in feed. These events can result in changes to gut bacteria, allowing salmonella to pr...

Working dogs: Feeding for performance

Unlocking nutrition can be the key to a successful working dog. If you were to speak to the All Blacks or Lisa Carrington about eating well for performance, you would discover they employ chefs and nutritionists to ensure they are eating the best for their performance on the field or on the water. Well, your working dog team can put some serious kilometres in and why not focus on their nutrition to get the most out of their performance? Dogs preferentially burn fat for sustained energy over prol...

A tail to tell

Tail breaking is one of the most common cattle-related welfare complaints that go through court in New Zealand. It is a breach of the Animal Welfare Act and likely constitutes serious misconduct. Tail damage is painful for cows and research shows an average of 20% of dairy cattle in New Zealand, approximately one million cows, have abnormal tails. Some of these have been shortened for medical reasons or it was performed before it became illegal, some have been damaged, and some have a dislocatio...

Are your bulls ready for mating?

Although it may feel like calving has only just started, it’s not long until thoughts shift towards mating. Whilst it is important to ensure your cows are in good condition and have plenty of feed, it is also vital to remember the other key player in your mating success – bulls. Bulls must be in tip-top shape in order to achieve maximum success at mating time. Condition should be on target (BCS 6-7) and they should not be suffering from any disease or illness. In addition, all bulls should m...

Cow technology and utilising data

You might have seen them, or you might already be using them. Cows with fancy looking ear tags, or in some cases cows wearing collars with strange ornaments on them. These “things” are not there to just look nice, they contain sensors helping farmers to collect data from their cows. They come in pretty handy for farmers and vets alike. ...

Drenching calves

Questions about drenching calves arise every season and over the years recommendations on what the right thing to do change - which can make things confusing. In this article we will discuss: when to drench, grazing issues, and practical animal health management. All of which can lessen the impact of worms. Let's start at the beginning when calves first go out onto pasture and are still on milk....