Scotland's beef herds face growing threat from 'crypto' deaths

A CATTLE disease which was only recognised 40 years ago and which to this day little is known about it despite it causing diarrhoea and death in calves was yesterday described as "a bigger problem than was originally thought".

Professor Nick Jonsson from Glasgow University has been carrying out research into how widespread cryptosporidiosis, or "crypto" in farming speak, is in Scottish beef suckler herds and his early view is that "there is strong evidence of it being a substantial problem".

The evidence backing that view is still scanty but he pointed to work he had been doing in the North-east of Scotland where results from 40 beef herds were being now collated.

On farms where there was believed to be a crypto problem and where scour was found in the calves, some 2.7 per cent of the calves died compared with farms where there was no evidence of the disease and only 1 per cent of the calves died.

While his work had taken place in one part of Scotland, he did not believe the problem existed only in that area as he knew of crypto deaths in most of the beef producing parts of the country.

But beyond that knowledge he said there were many unanswered questions including why did some farms seem to be affected and others did not.

The problem for those trying to deal with this single-celled parasite is that it is very difficult to treat in its habitat in the stomach lining.

Trying to pin down another difficult parasite whose cost to the Scottish livestock industry has been put at more than 50 million annually is Dr Philip Skuce from the Moredun Research Institute.

He said that while liver fluke was very easy to identify in dead animals as the infected liver could easily be cut open, identification was not so easy in live animals.