Calf with bald patches

hopeso

I have a 3 week old calf with bald patches. The hair on the top of her head is almost all gone. There’s another patch on one shoulder, and on the back legs. There seems to be slight scabs on the bald areas too... Any ideas?

tanko

hopeso wrote: »

I have a 3 week old calf with bald patches. The hair on the top of her head is almost all gone. There’s another patch on one shoulder, and on the back legs. There seems to be slight scabs on the bald areas too... Any ideas?

Has she a lot of white hair, is it possible for an animal that young to get photosensitization (brown snout)???
Is her nose affected?

hopeso

tanko wrote: »

Has she a lot of white hair, is it possible for an animal that young to get photosensitization (brown snout)???
Is her nose affected?

No, she’s a red Limousin. I didn’t remark the nose as being so bad, but I’ll look tomorrow.

Base price

Sounds like ringworm to me.

hopeso

Base price wrote: »

Sounds like ringworm to me.

Could it be, at that age? What’s the best treatment, if it is?

Base price

hopeso wrote: »

Could it be, at that age? What’s the best treatment, if it is?

I know it seems awfully young but I have seen ringworm on young calves that were bought in. Is the calf bought or suckler bred.

Base price

We use Bactakil 55. It is a litre spray bottle and normally one spray to the affected spot/area kills the ringworm.

If calves/cattle are indoor then you need to spray feed barriers with something like Optecide.

hopeso

The calf was born on the farm, outdoors.
To me, the bald areas are larger than what you’d normally see with ringworm. For instance, the top of the head is almost completely bald between the 2 ears. The skin is pink colored, with slight flaking or scabbing.

valtra2

This happened me with a calf this year. Have you injected her with any penicillin. Had she a scour. My one had a scour and lost a lot of hair on head and other patches. She fine now 3 months later would hardly know.

_Brian

Sounds like mange more than ringworm if it covers such large areas.

TooOldBoots

Usually the calf would loose hair as a result of stress. Maybe it had a bad scour or got some sort of a knock back at some stage. The hair will grow back once you get the calf thriving

Sugarbowl

Happened here after the calf got very bad scour. Patches all over the body. Vet said he had seen it happen before. Took a while to grow back but it is now. The mother cow licking her used to make is red and raw in places.

hopeso

I didn't notice any scour, or anything else, but on the other hand can't say for certain that she didn't have something unnoticed by me. She certainly wasn't treated with any medication, including penicillin. The cow licking it may well be making it worse. I suppose I'll just let her off and hope it clears up, especially as there seems to be no obvious reason.

Base price

hopeso wrote: »

I didn't notice any scour, or anything else, but on the other hand can't say for certain that she didn't have something unnoticed by me. She certainly wasn't treated with any medication, including penicillin. The cow licking it may well be making it worse. I suppose I'll just let her off and hope it clears up, especially as there seems to be no obvious reason.

Keep an eye on her for sunburn when and if the sun reappears again this summer.

hopeso

Just to update...The hair has grown back, so much that you wouldn't even notice the patches now. I guess it was some form of stress that caused it, as suggested....