Causes of diarrhoea in lambs during autumn and early winter in an Icelandic flock of sheep

• Main Author: Karl Skirnisson
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: coccidiosis; diarrhoea; mortality; pathogens; protozoans; sheep YFIRLIT; Iceland
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.506.8253; http://www.ias.is/landbunadur/wgsamvef.nsf/5ed2a07393fec5fa002569b300397c5a/18a9f0742a49d12c002572160078f819/$FILE/Causes of diarrhoea.pdf

In 2002 intestinal parasites and bacterial infections were studied on the Fossárdalur sheep farm, Eastern Iceland, where for years lambs have suffered from severe diarrhoea in autumn and early winter that some-times has become fatal. Mainly food changes, but sometimes also Giardia duodenalis, were regarded as prob-able causes for short-term diarrhoea in some lambs soon after their return from upland ranges in September or early October. By the middle of October, after approximately three weeks ' grazing on lowland pastures, all examined lambs on the farm suffered from coccidiosis for one or more weeks, with severe diarrhoea and a typical weight loss. Oocysts per gram faeces (opg) values peaked two to three weeks after the onset of the diarrhoea. Lambs were highly susceptible to eimerian infections when they returned to the oocyst-contami-nated pastures in autumn. Massive spring coccidiosis is probably more or less avoided because lambs are usu-ally released, still protected against eimerian infections, at approximately two weeks of age to the vast, infec-tion-free summer rangelands. The common Entamoeba ovis, and rare Cryptosporidium sp., and rare helminth infections were never suspected of contributing to the autumn diarrhoea. Clostridum sp., the only pathogen-ic bacteria detected on the farm, was found in lambs arriving late from upland ranges with severe coccidio-