Facial Eczema

This is one of the biggest threats within our region from January to May every year. Facial eczema costs the NZ beef industry millions of dollars every year, the problem is its not consistent.

Some years you will see no issues at all on your farm, the next season it might almost wipe out an entire line of cattle leaving you in a deep financial hole not to mention the significant welfare issues for the affected animals. At Franklin Vets, we have a lot of experience dealing with facial eczema and can offer a fully inclusive offering to help you.

We offer advice on how to manage grazing patterns, crops or forage to minimise exposure.

We are regularly conducting spore counts to monitor the threat levels, contact us to find out what you need to do to submit pasture to find out the danger levels on your property. We also regularly update our website with regional spore counts.

We have a full range of the protective Zinc product Faceguard available. This is the longest lasting bolus on the market offering up to 6 weeks of protection from one application. We can even offer technician services for inserting the boluses if you need a hand.

Of course, if things do go wrong our veterinarians are able to assist with advice and treatment of affected animals, we can also blood test some seemingly normal animals to see if they have suffered liver damage. The rule of thumb is that for every animal showing symptoms there are 10 animals with liver damage that won’t show symptoms but will suffer productivity losses such as reduced growth rates or increased empty rates.