Animal Health - Diarrhoea in sheep and goats

Many diseases cause diarrhoea, leading to dehydration and death. These include colibacillosis, paratyphoid, Johne’s disease, Rift Valley fever, and coccidiosis, all of which can lead to mortalities.

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Gastrointestinal diseases in small stock usually result in diarrhoea: soft, watery droppings. Some of these diseases can be fatal and therefore require immediate attention.

COLIBACILLOSIS

Colibacillosis is a bacterial disease that can affect lambs and kids under two weeks old. Animals of this age are usually affected due to the following:

They fail to drink colostrum. Colostrum, the very first milk that emerges from the udder, is high in antibodies and nutrients. It is crucial that lambs and kids drink it, as it will help to protect them from colibacillosis and many other diseases.

Put another way, if lambs and kids don’t drink this milk after they are born, they are more likely to get sick!

Paddocks or kraals are dirty and wet.

Lambs/kids are already infected with another disease. This will make them more vulnerable to colibacillosis.

They are under stress. This can happen because they have been moved to another paddock or kraal, or there are too many of them in one enclosure.

The bacterium causing colibacillosis is present in the droppings of sick sheep and goats. When lambs/kids consume feed or drink water contaminated with these droppings, they become infected.

Signs

The animal is depressed and refuses to eat. It has watery, whitish-yellow or greyish diarrhoea known as ‘white scours’. The umbilical cord is sometimes red and swollen. The back legs are dirty with droppings. Lambs/kids usually die as a result of dehydration.

There are few signs of the disease in dead sheep and goats. On postmortem, however, one may find that the intestine is redder than normal and filled with a greyish-to-yellowish liquid.