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Calf with bad eye

T

Triple_S

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Joined
Feb 13, 2010
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Location
NC
What do you think this is? This calf is on the list that I make sure to check daily because its a graphted calf. I'm pretty sure this came on within 24 hours. I know (well at least i think I know) its not pinkeye. Nothing is swollen and there isn't any flys or seed heads out yet although it did get up to 84F today. Maybe a puncture from a barb wire? I'm lost. What do you do for it other than some antibiotics to keep infection down? I figure that eye will always be bad so I reckon I just found my next freezer steer. Other than the eye he's perfectly healthy.
badeye.jpg
 
has anyone tried to vetrycin pinkeye spray yet? It says you just spray it onto the eye and it heals right up...
 
Guess I was in denial. Never seen pinkeye this early in the year. How young can you vaccinate.
 
cleland said:
has anyone tried to vetrycin pinkeye spray yet? It says you just spray it onto the eye and it heals right up...
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I don't get pink eye often but have found the sprays useless. GC's treatment is the best way to go and if really sever patch the eye .
Had a very severe case here with a heifer calf and was lucky it hadn't ruptured . Had to get my vet out and he injected meds into the eye and sewed the 3rd lid shut ,when the stitches dissolved 3 weeks later her eye was perfect ,not even a dot . She is still in my herd and weens a heck of a calf each year .
 
I had a cow get the same thing, not quite as bad, about a week ago. Used my MedDart to give her Tetradure-300, brought her home the next day and started putting Teramycin in her eye twice a day. She was my oldest cow and had been real lame for the last two years, always lags behind the herd. The eye was starting to look a lot better, then she decided to become a downer from her chronic lameness, had to make the hard choice.
 
Cow herd is vaccinated 7 way blackleg(ultrabac 7 + somnus ) and respritory(virashield vl5). Calves don't get vaccinated until 3 weeks before weaning and then boostered at weaning. Never vaccinated for pinkeye because I usually only get 2 or 3 a cases a year. I'll treat him, the cow, and his stepbrother(?) in the morning with antibiotic and the bad calf with your mastitis trick. I usually use penicillin in the eye. Might even try some Copenhagen
:wink:
 
The onset of it being so fast ,as you said you check him everyday ,seems very sever for over night pink eye case. I was thinking maybe IBR , as it does sometimes show up as an ulceration of an eye in a young calf or new born, born to a PI cow.

I would take GC's advice and treat him with all of that and patch the eye, hopefully it does not perforate .

Good luck with him.
 
Triple_S said:
Homemade eye patch ideas?
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I'd shoot penicillian up in the eyelid in several spots. Then make a patch out of old jeans 6"x6" piece glue it on with tag cement. Leave the bottom open to let it drain. The patch will fall off on it's own. This is what we do for any and all pinkeye victiims from calves to mature cows and bulls.
 
we use excel in the eye lid 2ccs ussually only have to doctor them once. We get pinkeye quite a bit in the summer after roping them and doctoring we ussually cant get close enough to get a rope on them again. But most of them look good the next day.
 
I'm not sure that is pink eye. He isn't very squinty and the whole eye is white really fast. I expect it is pus inside the eyeball itself from an infection he got through the blood stream. How's his navel? That is the #1 place for the infection to come from. If that is what it is, you need to treat systemically to get to the bacteria from the bloodstream and not just on the eye itself. That won't help much. I would hit him hard with something like Nuflor that gets into places like eyeballs that are hard for the meds to get into. We had one a few years ago - orphan calf. Same deal. It cleaned up really nice. The pus clotted in the bottom of the eye and then was removed and he had no problems with the eye at all. Check the front of the cornea really well when you treat him. If it is smooth and not damaged, it isn't pink eye because by the time you get white like that with pink eye, you have an ulcer on the cornea.
 
aspen said:
I'm not sure that is pink eye. He isn't very squinty and the whole eye is white really fast. I expect it is pus inside the eyeball itself from an infection he got through the blood stream. How's his navel? That is the #1 place for the infection to come from. If that is what it is, you need to treat systemically to get to the bacteria from the bloodstream and not just on the eye itself. That won't help much. I would hit him hard with something like Nuflor that gets into places like eyeballs that are hard for the meds to get into. We had one a few years ago - orphan calf. Same deal. It cleaned up really nice. The pus clotted in the bottom of the eye and then was removed and he had no problems with the eye at all. Check the front of the cornea really well when you treat him. If it is smooth and not damaged, it isn't pink eye because by the time you get white like that with pink eye, you have an ulcer on the cornea.
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:agree:
 

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