The death of a suckler calf represents a significant financial loss, carbon wastage and an animal welfare concern. It has been estimated that 2.8% of calves from non-dairy enterprises in the UK die in the first three months of life which accounts for 43% of all on-farm deaths in animals aged less than 24 months on these holdings.
Vets Katrina Henderson and Iain McCormick from SRUC reviewed the postmortem examination findings from pre-weaned beef calves up to six months of age submitted between 2016 and 2020. This data only represents the beef calves submitted to SRUC's Disease Surveillance Centres during this time. The findings do reflect that preventable and common health issues are still very common causes of death in these age of calves.
During these five years, 1662 postmortem examinations were carried out, from which 2096 diagnoses were reported. The overall diagnostic rate was very high at 94%. These specific diagnoses do not include predisposing factors, such as poor colostrum uptake or diagnoses not considered relevant to the animal's death. This review highlights the usefulness of this type of investigation to beef farmers.
Some 50% of submitted calves were less than one month of age, with 25% under one week of age. The body weights at any given period varied widely, particularly in older calves, reflecting a broad range of daily live weight gains. (Fig A).
Across Scotland, the 10 conditions diagnosed most often (in order of frequency) are shown below in Table 1:
Table 1: Top ten diagnoses in pre-weaned suckler calves dying from birth to six months of age in Scotland (2016-2020)
Condition
1 E.coli septicaemia
2 Navel ill
3 Mannheimia haemolytica pneumonia
4 Cryptosporidiosis
5 Pastuerella multocida pneumonia
6 Coccidiosis
*7 = Dystocia (difficult calving)
*8 = Abomasal ulceration
*9 = Joint ill
10 Mycoplasma bovis pneumonia
*These conditions were of equal weighting.
There were some striking geographical differences, with several regional top 10 diagnoses unique to a particular area. For example, Salmonella Dublin was the third most common cause of death in suckler calves in the south-west; Histophilus somni pneumonia took fourth place in the north region, while central/south-east Scotland was the only region where bleeding calf syndrome and clostridial enterotoxaemia type D (pulpy kidney) featured in the top 10.
Table 2 shows the most common diagnoses in calves with pneumonia or diarrhoea confirmed as the cause of death. It should be noted that this list may not reflect the situation in calves that survive an episode of pneumonia or diarrhoea.
Table 2: Top 10 diagnoses in pre-weaned suckler calves dying as a result of pneumonia or diarrhoea
Pneumonia Diarrhoea
1 Mannheimia haemolytica Cryptosporidiosis
2 Pasteurella multocida Coccidiosis
3 Mycoplasma bovis Idiopathic necrotising enteritis
4 Histophilus somni Rotavirus
5 Trueperella pyogenes Coronavirus
6 Inhalation Attaching and effacing E coli
7 IBR E. coli K99
8 RSV Salmonella Dublin
9 Salmonella Dublin Parasitic gastroenteritis
10 Fungal pneumonia Salmonella Typhimurium
We looked at how successful colostrum transfer had been using Zinc sulphate turbidity testing. This test was carried out in 287 dead suckler calves aged 10 days or less and confirmed poor colostrum absorption in 87% (ZST <19 units) with absolute failure of colostrum absorption (ZST <5 units) in 46%. For calves with postmortem evidence of difficult calving (dystocia), these figures rose to 91% and 64%, respectively.
Dystocia was identified as a top 10 cause of mortality in all regions across Scotland with 57% of the calves that had died due to a difficult birth having had a history of assisted delivery, with a further 13% having been delivered by caesarean section. The remaining 30% were born following unassisted calvings highlighting that these can also be associated with prolonged or traumatic calvings that compromise calf viability.
This review highlights that quality-assured postmortem examination is a worthwhile exercise in pre-weaned suckler calves, with a high success rate of reaching a diagnosis. Some of the top 10 diagnoses could have been predicted, but others, particularly regionally, were more surprising. Many of the leading 10 causes can be minimised through dynamic health planning with your farm vet. If deaths occur, investigating them is worthwhile and allows for sensible disease prevention strategies to be implemented on beef farms.
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