News Release
June 9, 2008

Meeting to discuss bluetongue June 30 in Worland

 

Sheep producers, veterinarians and others are invited to a meeting Monday, June 30, in Worland to learn more about the infectious disease bluetongue and how to prevent an outbreak in flocks of sheep.

 

The meeting is sponsored by the University of Wyoming Cooperative Extension Service (UW CES) and Wyoming Livestock Board (WLB). It begins at 7:30 p.m. at the Washakie County UW CES office, 1200 Culbertson Ave.

 

“There was a bluetongue outbreak last year in the Big Horn Basin so we want to give producers a heads up this year in an effort to prevent another outbreak,” said UW CES educator Ron Cunningham, who will lead the meeting with Jim Logan, assistant state veterinarian with the WLB.

 

Cunningham added, “We want to avoid a potential quarantine, a quarantine that could happen when producers are shipping lambs because this disease typically shows up in late summer and early fall.”

 

The meeting will cover what the disease is, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment and prevention.

 

The outbreak late last summer and early fall killed more than 300 sheep in the Worland, Otto, Basin and Greybull areas of the Big Horn Basin and led to sickness in hundreds of other sheep. The virus also killed pronghorn antelope and white-tailed and mule deer in the area.

 

Bluetongue is an insect-transmitted viral disease that can affect sheep, cattle, goats and wild ruminants, Logan said.

 

“Sheep are very susceptible to infection with an incubation period of five to 10 days following exposure from bites of infected insect vectors,” he said. “Mortality can reach 30 percent in infected animals, and pregnant ewes that survive the disease may abort or give birth to abnormal lambs.”

 

Clinical signs include difficult breathing, panting, depression, fever, inflammation of the muzzle, lips and tongue, anorexia, slobbering, ulcers on the lips and tongue, lameness and, occasionally, inflammation in the eyes.

 

“The disease is clinically indistinguishable from foot and mouth disease, vesicular stomatitis and other important diseases, and diagnosis must be confirmed by laboratory testing,” Logan said.

 

Bluetongue is on the WLB’s list of reportable diseases; therefore, producers and veterinarians are required by law to promptly report suspected or known cases to the state veterinarian, Logan said.

 

The WLB Web site is at http://wlsb.state.wy.us/, and the state veterinarian’s office can be contacted at (307) 777-7515.

 

Cunningham can be reached in the Fremont County UW CES office at (307) 332-1044 or ronc@uwyo.edu.

 

The Wyoming State Veterinary Laboratory, which is managed by the UW College of Agriculture’s Department of Veterinary Sciences, has additional information on bluetongue at http://wyovet.uwyo.edu/Disease_Updates.asp. Scroll to the 2007 link.

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Contact: Robert Waggener, Editor
Phone: (307) 766-3571
E-mail: robertw@uwyo.edu

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