ONE of Northern Ireland's leading pedigree breeders is in the midst of a dispute with the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs regarding the early testing for TB in his prize winning herd and the resulting cull of positive reactors.

The saga began last February when Sean Savage, from Ballynahinch, County Vown, completed the routine pre-movement test for tuberculosis on two of his British Blondes before they headed to a sale. The results were inconclusive so DAERA swooped in and by February 12 identified a total of nine animals that were positive reactors.

At the time, Sean, who runs the Shanvalley herd alongside son Shane, disputed the value of the animals but allowed them to be removed in order to maintain the health status of the remainder of the herd ahead of a further test 60 days later.

Obviously upset by the loss of nine animals, most of which made up part of the multi-champion show team and were thought of by Mr Savage as family, it wasn't until later that Sean spotted that the second test was undertaken at 47 days, nearly two full weeks before the guidelines set by the department.

A further five animals tested positive at this point, but having heard news that the initial nine cattle were actually clear of TB at slaughtering, Sean was loathe to lose another five and argued his case for the proper 60-day interval between tests. His request to retain the animals was denied but his disappointment grew when these five didn't show any signs of infection at slaughtering.

"The test is just not up to the job," said Mr Savage. "I've been told the lump at the test site can be caused by a bacteria and the lumps on my stock were still there 55 days after the test – that certainly isn't normal."

Adding fuel to the fire, Mr Savage believes the culled stock were majorly undervalued as both male and female siblings have regularly topped pedigree sales. One of these, a show winning bull, was valued by DAERA officials at £1500, while an independent valuer reckoned he would have realised in the region of £8500 at auction.

"I had a vet certification to say the bull was not fit to travel," said Sean of the bull, that was lame at the time of uplift. "It is a disgrace that the department could disregard their own rules."

When asked for a comment, a spokesperson for DAERA stated: “DAERA cannot comment on the details of an individual case. On a general point, an absence of confirmation of TB at slaughter or laboratory examination does not mean that an animal does not have TB.

"The tuberculin skin test is excellent at correctly identifying all but a few clear animals in a population (a specificity of about 99.89%) so when there is a reactor in a herd the breakdown is highly likely to be caused my Mycobacterium bovis (the bacterium that causes bovine TB) even if the post-mortem result and subsequent laboratory tests are negative. If there is more than one reactor in a herd the breakdown is extremely likely to be caused by M bovis even if there is no post-mortem or laboratory test confirmation."