Anyone ever deal with bacterial dermatitis

[chambero]

One of my month old Monopoly bull calves looked like he came down with mange and was sick.  So we ran him down in the pasture and caught him.  His whole body was covered with scabs under his hair.  We loaded him up and went to the vet.  After head scratching and some research, vet diagnosed him with bacterial dermatitis.  Said he'd seen 4 cases in 17 years.  Were treating him with Exceed.  Anybody ever deal with it and how did it turn out.  I don't know if he'll live or not, but he's still very strong, but ugly as all get out.

 

[justintime]

I have not had Bacterial dermatitis, but this sounds very similar to Photosynthization (sp) or an allergic reaction to the sun. Over the years I have had two of these . Eventually any white ( or lighter colored areas) will shed the hair and skin. The darker areas will be covered with scars and really look bad. Four years ago, I found one of my donor cows in the pasture with this condition. Her nose looked like old shoe leather, and was extremely sore. Her calf was doing fine, however her udder looked like her nose, so the calf was not getting much milk. I took her to the vet and this was what was diagnosed. I had to put her and her calf in the barn, in total darkness for several weeks and keep her on antihistamines for most of this time. I had to cover all the windows so that no light could get in. I felt so sorry for both her and her calf, but they both survived and got better. The heifer calf rebounded quickly and was good enough by fall to be selected for the Agribition sale, and sold for $4000. The cow was held open and was flushed successfully through the fall and winter. Once her skin shed off and new skin grew, she got better fast. Once she went back out on grass,after she was better, I swore she gained 20 lbs a day. I have never seen a cow change so quickly. The only other case I have seen was a neighbour had over 20 cows come down with this several years ago. The vet suggested it was triggered by an allergic reaction to something in the feed.

Not sure if your calf is like this or not, but the skin condition does sound similar.

 

[knabe]

my horse had something like this over about 1/4 of her body.  gave her antihistamines.  i changed hay immediately and never saw it again.  gave the hay to the cows.  might have had some C4 plant in it or something which would obviously not be a problem with cattle.

 

[chambero]

So what specific drugs are antihistamines for cattle?  A good dose of Benadryl?

 

[OH Breeder]

So what specific drugs are antihistamines for cattle?  A good dose of Benadryl?

Commonly with humans you give them a dose of IV Benadryl  and Pepcid IV to reduce the effects of an allergic reaction. The next step is steroids- like Prednisone(humans)for cattle Dexamethasone . Trienamine -Tripelennamine antihistamine for cattle, horses, dogs and cats.

 

[SKF]

We just went through that. One heifer was only 3 weeks old she lost a lot of hair and was very sick plus most of our other calves started getting it. The others were covered in scabs it was gross. Once we started treating them they all recoved just fine including the heifer who's hair fell out. Her hair is coming back now. The vet  said was caused because of all the standing water we had. We had so much rain that some of the calves spent the first few weeks of their lives wet. We gave the worst ones anitbiotics, washed them with a medicated shampoo 2x's a week, dipped them every day in a dip the vet gave us and put furizon on the exposed skin. Plus we had to pen them all up where they would stay dry. It was a lot of work but now they are all fine. I will get the name of the dip when I go out to the barn. Plus we treated all the calves that did not have it or were just starting to get it with Captan.

 

[cowgirl864]

captan(ortho- orthicide)  works really well, when we use it for every thing from rain rot to dermatitis you can use it on both horses & cattle

 

[SWMO]

Is Captan a overthe counter medication or only by vet?  I have at least one heifer in our show string with "rain rot" ever year.  This stuff is nasty.  We started having problems after a trip to Denver several years ago when a heifer came home with it.

 

[cowgirl864]

its a over the counter, just go to walmart or your local garden supply, ask for ortho-orthicide it's made for rose's  pour a couple handfuls in a bucket of water &rinse every day for a week( i just pour over their backs)

 

[hamburgman]

JIT you are referring to photodynamic dermatitis, which is different than bacterial dermatitis.  Photodynamic dermatitis is a liver malfunction.  The liver doesn't break down chlorophyll completely leaving a compound called phylloerythrin, this reacts with UV light and causes necrosis of the dermatitis on white hide.  Bacterial dermatitis can be prevented with fly tags in pigs, I would imagine the same could happen with cattle.  Treatment for sows used to a product that you mixed with water and it started with a p.  It can be difficult to treat this disease once it is started because of how the bacteria invade the skin.

 

[DL]

Bacterial dermatitis, photosentization and allergic skin reactions are THREE different conditions - consequently the treatment would be different

Photosentization has at least 3 different causes, including ingestion of photodynamic agents, liver disease and inherited defects of porphyrin

The use of furacin on cattle is illegal http://www.avma.org/reference/amduca/extralabel_brochure.pdf see page 2

 

[chambero]

I'm away from home this week, but my wife tells me the calf is holding his own (now turned into a bottle calf).  She thinks his lesions or whatever you call them are starting to dry out.  Only treatment so far is one dose of Exceed plus bath in iodine.

We'll see.

 

[GONEWEST]

Be careful. Does Iodine say it's safe for use in food animals on the label??

I know. I'm bad. I'm sorry I just couldn't help myself.