Janine and I started off our Tuesday morning by heading over to open up the practice up for the day. Upon arrival at the practice, we opened up the practice for the day so that the two workers there, Lady Lulla and Sena (spelling may not be correct here; I am not the best at spelling!), could manage it. Janine and I then drove over to meet Mark, Jane, and Anthony at Mark and Jane’s farm in Lobatse so that we could perform pregnancy diagnoses on around 100 cows.
Today would be a “practice pregnancy diagnosis” day for Janine, Anthony, and I. We would each be palpating every cow and taking our time to make sure we could have a good feel and understanding of the different stages of pregnancy in cows (as well as nonpregnant uteruses). I explained in an earlier blog entry what you normally feel for when performing the palpations – feel free to read back if you are interested!
We performed the 100 or so pregnancy diagnoses, and finished around noontime.
I was also able to examine some of the ticks on the cows today, including the Hyalomma and Rhipicephalus species of ticks. Mark also pointed out some udder conformational abnormalities, and explained that you should not seek to breed cows with poor udder conformations.
All in all, today was a wonderful way to sum up the pregnancy diagnosis skills I have learned while working with Mark this summer. It was also a lovely day out today! After today’s pregnancy diagnoses, I feel pretty confident in my abilities to accurately diagnose and stage pregnancy in cows – except when the cow is earlier than 8 weeks pregnant (Mark explained that this will take a lot of practice). I am so thankful for all of the learning opportunities Mark has provided to me in my stay here. Working with cows in Botswana this summer has only reinforced my passion to work with food animals in a developing country someday.
After we finished with the pregnancy diagnoses, and had examined enough ticks and udder malformations for the day, we all headed back to the practice.
On the drive over to the practice, we drove by the High Court of Botswana, and I took a picture of it for my boyfriend who is in law school!
When we arrived back at the practice, a little puppy had been dropped off this morning for his second series of vaccinations. The owner would be picking up the puppy later. This puppy was SO CUTE!
I had to take a few pictures with him, and gently give him his second series of vaccinations. 🙂
A little while later, a Doberman came in with uncropped ears. I didn’t realize this dog was a Doberman at first, as in the US, most Dobermans have characteristically cropped ears. It was nice to see a Doberman without cropped ears, as I am personally not a proponent of ear cropping (as it is an aesthetic and elective surgical procedure).
This Doberman had an abscess on its left hind end that had apparently already burst. Mark gently shaved and scrubbed the area thoroughly.
Mark then put a glove on and gently rectally palpated this dog with one finger, to make sure that this was not an anal gland abscess. Mark explained that the abscess was not associated with the anal glands. This dog was apparently also diabetic and on regular insulin injections, so we performed an ear prick to test this dog’s blood glucose levels, which turned out to be normal.
This dog was placed onto Ranclav (containing the antibiotic amoxicillin and potassium clavulanate) and metronidazole (another antibiotic that will help fight off any infection with anaerobic bacteria in this instance). The Doberman and his owner were then on their way.
A cat later came in that was straining to urinate, but had a very small bladder. Janine explained that the straining may be due to a urinary tract infection (UTI) or feline lower urinary tract disease (FLUTD). The owner had limited funds to treat the cat, so this cat was given some penicillin (antibiotic) and Rimadyl (containing carprofen, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug). Janine instructed the owner to make sure the cat is urinating, and to bring the cat back in if the straining continues. After the cat and the cat’s owner left, Janine explained to me that if it is just a UTI, the penicillin should sort it out. Hopefully that is all it is, as I know with cats, blockage of the urinary tract can cause the buildup of toxins in the blood (namely the electrolyte, potassium) and in some cases renal failure.
After this cat left, Mark went over some of the dips you can use on cattle for ticks, mange, mites, and lice with Janine, Anthony, and I. Of the various dips that Mark mentioned, Mark asked us which one you cannot use on bulls in the breeding season. We did not know the answer to this, but apparently synthetic pyrethrins are spermicidal, so you don’t want to use synthetic pyrethrins on bulls in the breeding season. Interesting – and good to know!
Once the day winded to an end, Janine and I headed out to finish our day with another couple of postmortem examinations. On the drive over to the feedlot, we saw a football (AKA soccer in the US) game going on near the road.
It is a pretty popular sport here!
We arrived at the feedlot and got started on the two cow postmortem examinations.
The postmortem examinations both again revealed frothy bloat. This feedlot is definitely having an issue with their feed which is causing the frothy bloat. We did a walkthrough this evening of their feed troughs and feed storage sheds to make sure that there were adequate amounts of hay, concentrate, molasses, and mineral supplements for feed mixing.
This feedlot could definitely do with some more feed in their storage shed, and may be a contributing factor to the frothy bloat issue at hand here.
After our walkthrough of this feedlot’s troughs and storage shed, and after Janine gave the feedlot workers recommendations as far as feed supplies and mixing are concerned, we were on our way home for the night. There was another nice sunset tonight that lit up the sky with beautiful hues of red, orange, and yellow.
Janine and I finished season 1 of Game of Thrones this evening. I am already becoming pretty addicted to this show, and will have to continue watching when I get back to the US! I still can’t believe tomorrow will be my last day of work here in Botswana! I guess I am excited to go home and see my family, boyfriend, and friends, but I will definitely miss this place and the great people I’ve met here. I’ll try not to be so sappy! I’m off to bed now, and will write again tomorrow!
Veterinary Medicine in Botswana 2013 