West Fork Veterinary Services

22/11/2024

We want to reach out to our clients and other livestock owners to discuss the importance of testing your forages. Specifically this year with a short hay supply and what looks like it may be a long winter. It is critical to know that the quality of your hay affects your animals through the winter and the ability to support offspring this coming year. The time to add condition to an animal is after lactation and prior to mid gestation. Do not wait until the animal is in late gestation or milking to try to improve the condition. We have purchased a hay probe which we are happy to loan to established clients. We have an account set up with Cumberland Valley Analytical, and we would be happy to submit the samples for you and consult regarding potential need for supplementation.

Dr. Katie MasonAssistant Professor and Extension Beef Cattle Nutrition SpecialistDepartment of Animal ScienceP: 865-974-8941 In the midst of a busy hay seas ...

08/10/2024

Everyone that has goats and/or sheep here's the post for you! We get lots of questions about how to check for parasites in those little guys. We recommend using the 5 point check system.

1. FAMACHA - the color of the inside of their eyelids. You just push right above the eye and then pull on their lower eyelid. That causes the conjunctiva to pop out so you can see a clear view of the color. The score for FAMACHA goes from 1-5: #1 is very pink or red to #5 which is very pale. Anything at a 3 or below likely needs to be dewormed immediately.

2. Check their jaw - If they have a heavy parasite load the underneath of their jaw may be swollen. This is edema, or "bottle jaw". Usually they have to have a pretty significant parasite load to for this to occur.

3. Body condition - The way to check is to put your hand on their spine and feel for signs of fat or if you can feel more of their spine than normal. Just because a small ruminant has a distended abdomen does not mean it is in good body condition!

4. F***l staining - This means to check their for scours. Sometimes if the small ruminant gets f***l staining bad enough it can cause flies to lay eggs, and you could have a bigger problem on your hands! This scale is usually from 0-5. With 0 having no staining and 5 having severe staining down the hocks.

5. The coat - The coat should be slick and shiny. A small ruminant with a poor and rough looking coat could mean it has parasites.

It is important to know that some of these signs can mean something entirely different. When you are checking for parasites its better to look at the 5 point criteria to make deworming decisions. For example a poor body condition could be a sign of poor nutrition rather than parasitism. Diarrhea and f***l staining may likewise be a sign of stress or their diet.

For further or more information:
https://swnydlfc.cce.cornell.edu/submission.php?id=986&crumb=livestock%7C10

04/10/2024

We stopped by our local Tractor Supply in Clarksburg today and left a donation for the farmers and horse owners in North Carolina. If you can, stop by and donate something for the people in that area who have lost so much.

Thank you to the people that have organized the drop-off and transport to NC.

30/08/2024

We are ramping up for pregnancy checking season in cattle. With cull cows still at record highs and forage/hay in short supply it makes more sense than ever to make sure you aren't keeping open cows through the winter. We have several farms scheduled in the coming weeks. Saturdays tend to get booked up most quickly.

We offer re**al ultrasound pregnancy diagnostics which is easier on the cows, more accurate at earlier gestation, and easier on Dr. Stenger's shoulder ;)

It is also a good idea to age cows if you don't have detailed records so you aren't keeping cows that will have a hard time through the winter.

Message on here or call at 3049318484 for scheduling. Please leave a message as we are often out of service or unable to immediately answer the phone.

If you are outside our practice area, we are happy to try and refer you to a veterinarian that covers your area.

28/08/2024

With the drought conditions affecting this area there are additional threats to your livestock other than the lack of grass or water. The limited water resources and severe weather conditions can also affect them by increasing the risk of certain diseases. Epizootic hemorrhagic disease (EHD) is one disease that can show up with droughts. ***We recently saw a case of a cow with EHD in Marion County and ask to share this with farmers in the area so they can be on the look out.***

EHD is most commonly found in deer. Cattle may get it because the deer will be concentrated around the limited water sources increasing spread to the cattle. The gnats (biting midge) that spread the disease will breed at that watering source and can go from deer to cattle and spread EHD.

Epizootic hemorrhagic disease is often not fatal to your herd, but it does cause them harm and discomfort. Some signs that they may exhibit are fever, anorexia, difficulty swallowing or excessive drooling, lameness, and ulcers in or around the mouth. It is noted that their skin may be thickened and edematous. These signs can lead to dehydration, emaciation, and aspiration pneumonia. Abortions and stillbirths have been reported with the disease as well, fortunately this disease has a low mortality rate for cattle if caught in time.

The only real treatment is supportive care with anti-inflammatory drugs and supplemental feed. This is a reportable disease. The way to test for it would be to draw blood and send it off through an official State or Federal laboratory.

01/08/2024

With LOTS of pinkeye cases this year here is some information on it.
Pinkeye is also known as Bovine Keratoconjunctivitis. It affects the surface of the eye which causes the foggy lens. Younger cattle are more prone to it, but older cattle can still be affected.
Cattle get pinkeye by trauma to the eyes, dust, or sand blowing into the eyes, face flies (as seen below), and UV irradiation.
There are FDA licensed vaccines such as Solidbac pinkeye vaccine that are effective against the most common bacteria Moraxella bovis, and then there are autogenous vaccines that can be made from a local veterinarian taking swabs of infected cattle and sending them off to have a vaccine custom made for different bacteria.

Outside of vaccination, there are other management strategies that can be used to reduce face flies. A common practice is to feed a mineral with sulfur, garlic, or other components that inhibit flies directly or larval development in cow f***s. Farmers also sometimes sue fly sprays or rubs which will reduce fly populations.

Even with the use of vaccines, fly spray, and adequate shade sometimes pinkeye outbreaks still occur. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, but sometimes with the best management cattle still become infected.

Pinkeye does have a high recovery rate if treated early. Pinkeye is commonly treated with antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medications. We have had success this year with Macrosyn (Tulathromycin) a long-acting antibiotic, and Prevail (Banamine) that is for pain and inflammation in the eye. If the infection isn't treated quickly then sometimes more invasive treatments are required such as patches and eyelid injections.

Prompt treatment will make almost any treatment effective and prolonged cases can become so severe that no treatment will work and the animal may have to have its eye removed (enucleation).

18/06/2024

Happy National Veterinarian Appreciation Day to Dr. Robert Stenger! No one else can be a better only large animal vet boss other than you! Always there for the animals whether they’re yours or someone else’s!
Today is your day….to spend in the clinic doing paperwork because it’s too hot🤣
Happy Veterinarian Appreciation Day to you!!

16/04/2024

We get this question a lot, so we decided to make a post explaining a bit about how to age your horse by its teeth. For older horses it is as much an art as science with guesses based on wear and other parameters. But younger horses can be aged fairly accurately. Age determination is based on the front teeth, also known as incisors.

Here are the some common ways to estimate the age of your horse-
•Occurrence of permanent teeth.
Temporary incisors show up at 8 days, 8 weeks, and 8 months of age. At one year of age all temporary teeth are present. Then by 3 years of age there are large permanent center teeth, both lower and upper. At age 4 the horse has well developed permanent centers, immature intermediates and milk teeth at the corners. Their “tusks” or “canines” have also appeared. At 5 years of age the temporary teeth have been replaced by permanent teeth. They now have what is called a “full mouth.”

•Disappearance of cups (dark brown, hollow indentations in the enamel)
At 6 there starts to show some wear on the corner teeth. Cups in the lower jaw and in the centers should be worn down.
At 8 the cups have disappeared completely from the lower jaw, but the teeth on the upper jaw are present. Dental stars have appeared in four lower and two upper incisors. Dental stars are marks that appear in the central pulp cavity of the teeth as the horse ages.
At 10 the mouth shows a typical angle of incidence. Ordinarily cups are gone from all of the teeth except the upper corners at 10 years of age.
At 11-14 it is hard to differentiate between the two ages.
At 15 all the cups are gone. Central enamel rings are prominent but are very small and round. All teeth have become angular.
At 21 the length of the teeth, acute angle of incidence and triangular surfaces characterize the mouth. Spaces have also appeared between the teeth.

Some other ways you can determine age are:
•Angle of incidence- Which is the angle formed by the meeting of the upper and lower incisor teeth.
•Shape of the surface of the teeth- Teeth appear broad and flat in young horses. From 8-12 years the back surfaces become oval, then triangular at about 15 years old.
•Abnormal teeth conditions- “Parrot mouth” is where the upper and lower incisors don’t meet.

It is often easiest to pull up a chart on your phone and compare it to the teeth of your horse. It is common for “experts” to age a horse differently, so understand there is wiggle room in most horses ages especially woth an unknown history.

Being able to pinpoint age within a fairly narrow range can be of use to owners of unregistered horses or horses whose age is unknown for any reason. Many health and nutrition management decisions are directly related to age and dental wear, making it even more important for all horse owners to have...

06/04/2024

Another heartbreaking story with sale barn dairy calves. The client bought three calves last weekend. One calf died the next day, they tried treating the 2nd at home but it died within 2-3 days, and the third I saw last night on emergency at 8pm.

Please share and spread the word. If you buy newborn calves expect serious illness and consult your veterinarian to treat preemptively. If you wait until they are sick and not eating you are already behind the 8-ball.

I have contacted the State Dept of AG and State Veterinary Office. I have meetings to discuss the issue. If you have time and feel passionate about the well being of these newborn claves and want to support ethical livestock practices in the State please call 304-558-2214 (State Dept of AG) and voice your concerns.

This client called the department of AG and said she was told it is a buyer beware market. The official she talked to didn't seem concerned about the welfare of these animals or her children having to watch the new calf they bought die in front of them.

22/03/2024

Not every day is puppies and baby lambs here at West Fork Veterinary Services, though that is often what we post to social media. Unfortunately, part of being a veterinarian is that we must deal with sick animals. I apologize for the disheartening images, but feel it is my obligation to share this information. Today, we had an emergency call for some very sick bottle calves. We rushed out as soon as we could, but one had already died and another died during the visit.

The calves we saw are dairy calves that were purchased from a local sale barn within the last few days. These calves are originally bought out of state and shipped for hours back here to be resold locally. They likely did not get colostrum, were comingled - increasing the risk of infectious disease, and were ran through sale barns all causing a drastic increase in the risk of sickness from environmental stress and pathogens. The livestock “trading” sector is an unfortunate “black sheep” of the agriculture industry, and when it happens to newborn calves it is heart breaking.
Part of the issue is that these calves often look healthy when they are run through the sale barn; as the incubation period for common diseases can be days to weeks. So, if the buyers are not warned about the risks and do not have experience with these high-risk calves, they have no clue what is about to happen or how to care for them. Unfortunately, there seems to be a higher volume of trade in these calves with the increase in homesteads and new farmers since Covid. People are being taken advantage of for a quick dollar and often have such a bad experience they quit farming as soon as they start. The owners we met today were a grandfather and granddaughter who had saved up money for some time to purchase these calves. They spent $650 per calf for a total of $3900. Two calves have died already, and another is in critical condition. For these owners it was not only a serious financial loss but also devastating emotionally. While we were treating the calves one of their great grandchildren came to the barn to check on “his” calves. It made me want to cry and boiled my blood at the same time.

I take cases like this very personally. Mikaela can vouch that I was fuming, and probably drove a little too fast on the way to the call. Not only as a veterinarian is it my duty to be an advocate for animal health and welfare, but as a proud livestock farmer it infuriates and shames me that these practices are being done in an industry I love. It hurts the animals, it hurts the young/new farmers who don’t know better, and it hurts the agriculture industry. It only helps the short-term pockets of the traders who are peddling these calves.

My plan is to speak with both the State Veterinarian Office and the Department of Agriculture to see what can be done to get some legislation passed to protect these animals, our local farmers, and West Virginia agriculture. We are a State in which the vast majority of farmers are small operators or homesteaders. We need to fight for the welfare of our animals and our small farmers. I hate to shed a bad light on animal agriculture, but I would hate more to stay silent and do nothing when these practices are happening every day. This is not an isolated event. I see it every year. To the point that someone will call and say they have a sick bottle calf, and I can make 2-3 guesses and pick who or where they purchased the calf. A few years back, I had a call where grandchildren went to the sale bought some cute seemingly healthy dairy calves, yet within a few days two had died. We were treating the remaining two, which were starting to turn around, when a heat lamp fell in the middle of the night and burnt down the person’s entire garage. I have countless other stories with the same theme.

We need to do better. We must do better. Where good people are silent bad things continue to happen. When you watch a newborn calf die in the arms of a grandchild in front of their grandparents, you will know what I am feeling and why I am so upset and ready to fight for change. If this message doesn't sit well with you, then you or your livestock practices are the problem.

Please share this with anyone you know in agriculture, especially anyone that may be considering purchasing animals from a sale, auction, or through Facebook. At the very least we need to make sure that the people who buy these calves are doing so with an understanding of how to properly care for them and understand what is at stake for them and the animals.

TL;DR
Young newborn dairy calves are being bought out of state and sold at high prices to unknowledgeable people. The animals are suffering, and the people are suffering. Please share to help spread the word. DO NOT PURCHASE SALEBARN OR AUCTION CALVES unless you are experienced and prepared to treat them.

13/03/2024

Spring is coming!! Do you feed your cattle high Magnesium minerals to prepare for the Spring flush? If not you should, because magnesium is necessary for proper nerve function. It also aids in growth, reproduction, and metabolic function.

You want to find a good high magnesium mineral with minimum 12-14% magnesium. It is preferred to have fresh loose minerals out, but blocks can work in some situations. We just picked up some today for Dr. Stenger's own cattle. Foster Feed is where we got the mineral, and you can see the label attached.

Without a high magnesium mineral your cattle may be at risk of developing grass tetany. Grass tetany consists of staggering, muscle twitching, convulsions, and in severe cases death. It is a disorder associated with low magnesium levels in the blood. It is most important to give a high magnesium mineral in preparation for when the risk of grass tetany is most severe. For our area the ideal time is around mid-February to mid-April and again in the Fall September/October when cool season grasses flush again. To be the most precautious it is better to have magnesium intake at about 0.6 oz. per day. Some magnesium may be supplied through forage and feed as well.

01/03/2024

These litter of livestock guardian pups and the other litter got vaccinated with DAPP earlier this week! DAPP stands for Distemper, Adenovirus-2, Parainfluenza, and Parvovirus. They received their first vaccine at 6 weeks old, they will receive three more vaccines in their puppy series at 8, 12, and 16 weeks old. It is recommended every pup gets this starting from 6-8 weeks old, specifically so they don’t get Parvovirus. Parvovirus can be fatal and devastating to a whole litter. It makes them weak and lethargic with severe vomiting and diarrhea. Luckily we have never had Parvo on our own farm but we have purchased puppies that were unvaccinated that developed the disease shortly after we got them home.

An ounce of prevention is worth hundreds of dollars of cure!

These pups were extremely brave and didn’t cry once! The farm page got to see the other litter, so we figured this liter needs some love as well!

20/02/2024

Heifer and bull calf twin calves we pulled this morning!
This is a perfect example of why if a cow/heifer is having trouble calving and you have to pull one, you should check for another. Especially if the first one is on the small side!

With these being a heifer and a bull calf there is a chance of the heifer being a Freemartin. What is a Freemartin you may ask? A Freemartin is a heifer that is infertile after being born twin to a bull calf. In the majority of cases the female twin is completely infertile. The heifer calf may show characteristics of a bull calf as well. The bull twin is only affected by the possibility of reduced fertility.

These two calves were on the smaller side, and we were scared we may have been too late as we didn’t feel any movement during the fetal manipulation, but luckily they both made it. The first calf was coming shoulder first so Dr
Stenger had to reposition the head and feet to allow passage through the cows pelvis. What a surprise to reach in and feel another one!

16/02/2024

Taking your horse out of state? Trail riding, boarding, bringing in a new horse? Then they would probably need an updated Coggins test! Coggins are good for a year, and it tests for Equine Infectious Anemia. Equine Infectious Anemia causes the horse to be lethargic, edema, and keeps horses from eating. There is no current treatment available for this disease. Coggins just consists of the Veterinarian coming out to your farm, drawing blood and sending it off to a lab to test for the disease. We use an online source Global Vetlink to take pictures of your horse and log the markings they have for official identification. This paper below has the paper version, but Dr. Stenger’s drawing skills support the use of digital forms 😉. Also it is easy for the client to access the Coggins at anytime if they lose or need another copy!

30/01/2024

With lots of people calving at this time it’s important to notice when the cows/heifers are having trouble.
Some signs include:
•If the water sac has been visable for 2 hours and there has been no progress.
•If the cow has been pushing for 30 minutes and nothing has changed.
•If the calf looks like it might be breech, or in an abnormal position.
•The cow is showing signs of stress, or fatigue

This is a “miracle baby” Dr. Stenger pulled last week! The momma’s water broke at 5am that morning, and the farmers were doing an amazing job of checking her every hour for signs of progress! Around 9am, she still had no progress so they attempted to pull the calf themselves and noticed the calf was coming back feet first. When Dr. Stenger got there it was around 12 that afternoon. The calf was not moving, so it was suspected to have passed away. But when Dr. Stenger woth the assistance of Mikaela and rhe owners got the hips loose and pulled it out the rest of the way the calf was still alive around 1pm that afternoon! A big bull calf! It was amazing after all that time and being backwards that the calf hadn’t aspirated birthing fluids.

12/01/2024

Final day of “Meet the team!” We saved the best for last! Starting from the left to the right, we have Aberdeen, Salto, and then lastly our new addition Skibbereen! They can sometimes be seen in the back of the vet vehicle, but mostly the back of the side by side.
Aberdeen enjoys all things herding.
Salto enjoys herding by himself, without her lol
Skibbie is learning her likes and dislikes at the moment but she seems to like her crate!