Help for foot rot?

[Border rancher]

We have a young cow (feeding a big calf) that has foot rot in one back and one front foot. We gave her a large dose of oxy tet to start with, with no improvement. A couple weeks later we gave her a large dose of LA penicillin and 8 large sulfa pills. Still not much difference. I guess the next step must be the foot soaks with the formalin or copper sulphate solution, but that is a lot of work as I know from past experience. Does anyone know of anything else that might help?

[Faster horses]

WELL, #1~are you sure it is hoof rot?

Did you take her temperature?
Was the foot (feet) swollen at the coronary band?
Did it, does it stink real bad?

You may not be dealing with hoofrot; you may be dealing with a bad-footed cow. Is there cracks in her toes?

We had a customer call us last winter that was "getting a lot of hoof rot." So we checked it out. Every cow had cracks in their feet. We took temperatures; no temperature on any cow.

What had happened was, the rancher was feeding cake in big pastures. We had a severe cold spell. The cattle were travelling quite a ways to water and quite a ways to the cake on badly frozen ground. That set up the scenerio for sore-footed cows to show up. And the ones that showed up all had long toes or cracks in their toes.

What I found interesting was that this rancher had called two or three vets and they all said to treat with LA-200 and sulfa boluses. The ones they treated did not get better. Not one vet went out to look at what was going on. But they sure took his money for the medication.

And we wonder why we have a problem with antibiotics in this country?

[Faster horses]

P.S. I went back and read your original post.

I really don't think LA Penecillin is the drug of choice for hoof rot. Needs to be something stronger. If you are sure it is hoof rot, treat it with LA-200 and, gosh, I hate to give her all those boluses again. Sulfa is so hard on the kidneys when given in massive doses. You might check with a vet about redosing with sulfa boluses. The standard treatment here for hoofrot is LA-200 and sulfa boluses given at the same time.

If you are not sure it is hoofrot, get the cow in where she doesn't have to travel so much. I would really recommend trimming her feet (if she has long toes) and keeping her up for a few days; more than likely she will improve from not having to travel.

You also could be looking at an abcess. If it is an abcess, you need to dig around in the bottom of her feet. You might find a soft spot and you can make a place to let the abcess drain.

I really doubt that it is an abcess or hoofrot since it is in two feet.

[Border rancher]

No, we didn't have our vet look at the cow. I did a net search for footrot and all symtoms and pictures I saw there fit exactly. It also was the usual footrot circumstance for our area, real dry weather for a long time followed by 8 inches of rain over a few weeks. (The latter is not the usual but was very welcome)
We don't usually use much antibiotic, but I felt so sorry for the cow! If she recovers she will raise more calves and if not, she will be on the BSE test list so shouldn't get any antibiotic in anybody's dinner!
I guess I should try to bring the animal in to the chute and try to soak the worst foot anyway. We did that to a bull a few years ago and after the first few times he limped aroug sticking his foot in any pail or trough he could find. The bulls foot did clear up, I assume from the soaking.

[Lulu]

Border Rancher:

If you can get your cow up use plain old peroxide to " boil" out that are between her toes. It might help.

I've had 2 cows in the past with horrible, HORRIBLE feet problems and we eventually had to do away with the cow BUT by doses of LA-200 and keeping her up close in and keeping her feet cleaned out... each cow lasted till the calf was weaned.


But, if it's in both feet it might not be footrot as it usually just effect one foot per flare-up. Good luck and be careful cause even with a sore foot they can kick the snot outta you!

[Cal]

[Cal]

I should have read slower, didn't realize she had it in two feet. Oops!

[Jinglebob]

I hate treating bulls with hoofrot and a vet told me the best was 10 cc of Micotil. If the one shot didn't get it, it wasn't going to get healed up! Don't know if this helps or not.

I also had a very similar experience as Cal. Might be worth getting her in or tied down and checking the feet.

A couple years ago we were having a problem with sore feet in some pairs. the guy who owned them suggested i put Lime around all of the water tanks. sure seemed to get things shut down, as far as sore feet.

Whenever we doctor a yearling with a sore foot, we always run them a ways before we rope them, so as to get the foot broke open and draining. Seems to do as much good as the vaccine! Sure makes them easier to deal with after they are caught too!

[Dakota Sunshine]

Our vet has told us to give penicillin shots daily for 10 days on the stubborn cases. Not much fun but it has worked. Hope she gets better!

[the real jake]

Faster Horses, I would like to echo your thoughts. I thought you were right on. Tylan 200 can be a good remedy also, if you can still buy it.

I have doctored yearlings that could hardly get around, and the next day you could hardly tell they had it. That was using LA 200.

[Big Muddy rancher]

[Faster horses]

Before we got on a good mineral program
we had chronic hoof rot and we had to take toes off some of the cows.
And some cows, the infection got into the joint~hock, etc. That is nasty. They are done for then.

Just don't have much trouble any more tho!!
Another PLUS for a good mineral program.