I
have had the request from several prominent breeders to give my opinion on the core or main vaccines necessary to raise healthy productive cattle. I will also mention a few others that are used in specific herds or groups of cattle for specific reasons. The science of vaccinology is ever evolving and we will continue to see more intranasal vaccines developed and potentially oral vaccines. More and more are used in combinations so the number of ‘shots required at one time is often limited to two or
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less. The human COVID 19 pandemic is a very real reminder on how vaccines could prevent disease spread by vaccinating the vast majority of the population. You can bet manufacturers are frantically doing their best to make this a reality. Vaccination is one of the best forms of biosecurity on our farms and ranches. I will be focusing on the diseases in this article and will use specific brand names as a reference . Keep in mind there are three to four very large vaccine manufacturers out there so most of these diseases you have three or four choices of product to get the job done. Some vaccines have slight advantages over each other but rely on your herd veterinarian, fellow breeder or producer and your pharmaceutical rep to help determine the best combination of products for you. Let’s start with the calves and now if producers have trouble with pneumonia there are two intranasal products given early in life to help prevent pneumonia in the first two months of age. They ‘re inforce for the viruses and Once PMH IN for the bacteria. All calves at turnout to pasture are processed in this country generally at about the three months of age. Products used contain the clostridial or blackleg like diseases as well as histophilus. These often come in combination together but remember when used in combination never contains tetanus. This only becomes necessary if you band large calves. Then tetanus must be given before the banding with a different clostridial shot. Calves are also given the viral and bacterial vaccines for pneumonia. They are often combined in one shot. Again there are three vaccines out there that get this job done. They are Vista Once or Pyramid Presponse or Bovishield Gold One Shot. That means hopefully you are giving one of these vaccines otherwise the vaccination program is pretty inadequate in my opinion. There are slight differences in these vaccines such as in two the bacterial component is a killed vaccine and in one of the products does contain Pasteurella Multocida one additional bacterial cause of pneumonia. The combination of the bacterial histophilus and the pneumonia pathogens are
