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Silage sickness.

R

rrlund

Well-known Member
I just read an article in Michigan Farmer about the danger of feeding spoiled silage.It says there is the same danger from spoilage in silage bales. Says it causes botulism or listeriosis. Says the symptoms of botulism can be mistaken for hypocalcemia or ketosis but won't respond to treatment. It doesn't say treatment to what. Treatment to hypocalcemia and/or ketosis,or to ANY treatment?
It says that listeriosis is also called circling disease or silage sickness. It goes in to the symptoms,but doesn't say if it's treatable.
So,are botulism or listeriosis treatable in cattle or are they a death sentence if the cow ingests too much spoiled silage?
Just something that might be good to know some day.
 
Clostridial vaccines such as blackleg nnalert provide some protection against botulism and other mycotoxins such as Aflatoxin which is very common in corn in my area of the deep south, all are produced from mould and I am sure you would see it and smell it if your silage or hay was badly infected. Circling disease, or Listeriosis, is the one reason you don't find many sheep in Louisiana any more, there were terrible outbreaks in the 70's that killed plenty of woolies here, the toxin was in the ground and when sheep were on short pasture in hot dry weather or fed late cut hay full of dirt from drouth stressed meadows they died like flies. I remember it well as we lost around 50 ewes one year, we saved a few with several doses of antibiotics but the main trouble was by the time they were really showing signs they didn't last long.
 
I would say your feeding practices are such that it is not probable to happen. That is to say you are putting enough material in front of the cows that they can pick through and ignore the spoiled material. The people I have heard of having animal health problems barely feed enough material not accounting for poor or spoiled material thus the animal is forced to ingest material it normally would not. I am also aware of a fellow that does such a poor job getting his hay made in a quality manner that he has chronic health issues with the cows and has an extremely high mortality rate. I am for the most part one to keep my nose out of other people's business but that fellow should not be allowed to do what he does. At some point the conditions will be so that the media will jump in and create another headache for those that do practice good management techniques.
 
Ya,I think it said something to the effect that the spoilage had to be 4-6% of the diet or some such thing. I cover my corn silage in the bunker,don't make any silage bales. I don't know if a steer would get a taste for something in the bunk if there was a craving in their diet or not,if there was to be a big chunk of black stuff off the top that didn't get blended in the silage cart. I've seen them gnaw down to the concrete through some old leftover stuff in the bottom of the bunk. I don't know if it's soaked with salt from a salt block disolving in wet weather or what.
 
My experience is the cows LOVE the spoiled stuff unless it is really bad. They eat it like candy.

There's no picking through it. It's the first material to disappear.

Of course with upright silos there is no appreciable spoilage if you feed out of it every day.
 
You are getting some things mixed up and intertwined.

Mycotoxins and Aflatoxins are produced by Fungi. Botulism and Listeriosis are caused by Clostridium botulinum and Listeria monocytogenes.
 
There should be a much higher rate of sickness if the spoilage you are referring to was truly bad. I think what RR is getting at is sizable balls of black material or whitish-gray moldy balls which is much harder to sort if it goes through a mixer. I still maintain that an animal will refuse anything truly nasty which means they will be blatting even though you may see a fair amount of feed left in the bunk. The only time they would eat chunks of rotted or spoiled is if they are being under-fed to start with. Of course once in a great while something will get by an animal or there will be one ding-a-ling in the herd that has a bizarre taste preference.
 
not trying to make light of your concerns by no means,but few years back i had 8 bull calves on hay and what little winter pasture there was,was off on a job wife said that there was little over 1/2 bale of bermuda hay left in the ring didn't think that would last until i could get in to go get another load,sent her and the boys to buy a bale from the neighbor until i got in,warned them not to buy rye grass hay from him because he baled it to green was afraid it could be molded an hurt the calves,when i came in and checked what did i find the very hay i told them not to buy,calves had eat holes all around it a foot deep, outer layer looked ok but had 3 inch layer of mold under the outer, under that it looked like light colored molasses and smelled somewhat like molasses, noticed they hadn't eat the bermuda so i peeled off the molded they cleaned up the rest then went back to the bermuda didn't try any more but it never bothered them
 
I know of two cases where lots of cattle died from botulism. One was wrapped hay that was wet with a dead coon in it.Killed a dozen dairy cows.The other was wrapped bales of rye that was baled in the rain and the baler pickup to low and put large amounts of mud in the bales,killed eight dairy cows.We have fed lots of wrapped bales that have lots of white mold with no problem,but be careful with bales that show lots of red mold.Moldy feed usualy is not a problem unless you force the cows to eat it all.If a cow has enough to eat she won't eat the junk.
 
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