“It’s not looking good, guys,” said the vet, reaching for his callipers, and our summer plans for the farm suddenly came tumbling down. We were going to sell 17 two‑year-old bullocks, two pedigree breeding Galloway cows and one heifer the following day, but needed to test them for TB first – a legal requirement as someone within 3km of our land had a confirmed TB outbreak.
Four days earlier, the vet had injected the cattle with two separate injections that elicit an immune response to bovine and avian tuberculin. One of our nine-month-old calves reacted to the test, so we were given paperwork about TB restrictions and effectively shut down – unable to buy or sell any breeding or store cattle.
We’ve never had TB here before, but the risk is always there. I’d been very anxious before the test, unable to sleep, and now I burst into tears at the thought that the calf would have to be culled.
The vet went to his pickup, brought back a “TB reactor” tag and put it into the ear of the calf, who went into a shed in isolation. As we walked the other calves back to their field, the calf’s mother, Katie, realised that her calf wasn’t with the group. She started calling, and called for 24 hours for him before giving up.
I was thankful that the man collecting the calf was kind and allowed me to coax it into his trailer in an unhurried way. The positive test has emotional as well as financial implications; the vet mentioned counselling, and that several organisations are available to help farmers in our situation. We then had to wait to see if the calf had actually had TB, and if there was the ticking timebomb of a TB infection in our herd. There was a postmortem and laboratory tests.
This morning I opened an envelope from the Animal and Plant Health Agency, which said that the postmortem had not found TB (“no visible lesions”) and that the lab tests for TB were negative. It’s a relief, but we are still shut down and have more tests to do. It may be October before we are classed as “TB free”.
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