Environmental Management
Maternal shedding of enteric pathogens increases around the time of parturition. In intensive dairy production systems, calf pathogen exposure and subsequently the risk of morbidity and mortality can be reduced by removing the calf from the dam after birth and placing the calf in a clean, dry, sheltered environment.
Conversely, under extensive livestock husbandry systems where pathogen load is sparse and dispersed, the emphasis is on minimal interference to avoid mismothering. Neonatal calves are cold tolerant when dry and sheltered from drafts. Due to their lower body mass, lambs and kids are more susceptible to cold. Wet, drafty conditions lead to depletion of energy reserves and hypothermia. Hypothermia compromises colostral transfer and increases vulnerability of newborns to contagious and opportunistic pathogens. In cold conditions neonates generate heat by shivering and metabolism of brown adipose tissue. Neonates are born with short-lived, stored energy in the form of muscular glycogen.1 Colostrum is a critical source of concentrated energy to meet the metabolic demands of thermogenesis.
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