How to tell if cattle have lice and What to do?

before we start this video look at these two and that's the cutest thing you've ever seen hey there folks this is josh stoneyridge farmer welcome to another quick tips video here on the stoney ridge farm it is a beautiful february day and the cows are scratching they're infested we're going to talk a little bit about lice today lice and livestock we're going to talk about some holistic methods to control lice and livestock we're going to talk about some chemical methods to control lice and livestock and let you make your educated decision with your veterinarian so come along today we're going to get some cool shots of the cows some outtakes i guarantee you and we'll just have a little bit of fun learning together about livestock and lice this happens all right [Music] stoney farms [Music] welcome to the stoney ridge farm this is your first time in here please pound the like button jump in and subscribe to the channel you see this cow right here beside me you see that little spot right there there's a little speck where she's missing hair that is a sign that the cow has been scratching and has rubbed her fur off right there that is a sign of lice now there are two types of lice that you need to worry about in your cattle and these lice won't get on you as a person so you can walk through your cow herd and not have to worry about it i can't see lice on this cow i can't see lice on any of these cows but they're tiny little biting critters and they're just an annoyance and they also can cause weight loss in your cows or a reduced weight gain so with lice you can expect too up to a five percent less weight gain in your cattle now typically cows and livestock like goats and sheep and all sorts of livestock will pick up lice in the late fall mid to late winter and it's mid to late winter right now it's february here on the stoney ridge farm and the cows are all doing this they're exhibiting signs of lice they're over here scratching i've put some stumps out here in the pasture for the cows to have something to scratch on just a little bit and i notice these signs and symptoms of lice probably about a week ago i saw little bald spots and at first i thought our little donkey which is right over here which is just playful with the cows i thought the donkey was biting on the cows and pulling their hair out it wasn't the case now there are several different options for treatment the number one option which if you're holistically managing your cattle is moving your cattle and letting them have a little bit more space in the winter time in other words let them have a bigger pasture if you're intensively grazing cut that intensive grazing program down what's happened is just like with people these cows are crowded together so you see herd animals instinctively herd together just like these cows are doing right here if one cow's got it the other cows have it what's going to happen with these cows there are several different treatment methods there are poor on treatment methods and i'll tell you to consult with your own veterinarian on these methods or read up on it before you treat your cows because you don't want to harm your cows however there are plenty of methods that are holistic that if you just wait it out the lice will go away in most cases if you don't have a serious infestation of lice in your cattle you can wait until the warmer months their hair will slick off and the temperature outside on these black cows will be high enough that the life lice cannot survive so when the lice can't survive at temperatures over about 102 degrees they fall off they die no more lice problem sometimes people will run their cattle through their handling equipment in late fall early winter and do a pour on treatment to treat their cows for life throughout the winter that is pretty much the most common method there's another method of just let it go and you'll see the cows are scratching look at them a lot of them are scratching over here on this stump now i'm going to give you some options permethrin is one of the options it's probably the most commonly used option but there are some organic options that you can use to help control lice one of them would be sulfur powder but you have to treat your animals over and over and over again so if you have a goat that you milk every day and you want to treat it with sulfur powder you can do that tons of videos out on youtube but not a lot of videos talking about the reality behind owning cattle in the wintertime and owning livestock in the wintertime they will pick up lice now let me give you some holistic organic ways to get rid of your cow slice okay so now that we've explained to you that lice are a natural thing and it's something that occurs in nature and it's something that occurs in cattle herds it occurs in goats it occurs in a lot of different type of livestock it'll occur in your chickens it happens okay so and i'm going to post a link to this this is organic valley family of farms website this is information right out their website so neem oil is an ancient control insect control from india the neem tree is a natural insecticide so the combination of neem oil is affected against all parasites so you can treat your animals with neem oil or pyrethrin which is part of the chrysanthemum family of plants it's a crisp anthem flower i guess oil that you can put on your cows in order to cure the lice what are we going to do what are we doing here on the farm i treated this scratching area with neem oil just to give it something to help control the lice i don't have a huge infestation but some of the cows here do have lice and they needed to be cared for guys i hope you've enjoyed this little video the cows are gonna scratch themselves to death on the four-wheeler this is just the facts of life of owning livestock in the wintertime and i thought i'd share with you what's going on here on the stoney ridge farm so our cows have a little bit of lice we're gonna wait they'll shed off this winter coat in probably a month or so the skin temperature will get hot enough that the lice will fall off and the problem will be gone all right thanks a lot guys please found the like button jump in subscribe the channel i'd love to have you back so with the cows [Music] all right we're live here with butthead the cow butthead the cow how does the copeland rack taste please give me some feedback how delicious is the copeland rack and the atv i'd like to know everyone would love to know let's taste the camera bag next yes right there it is i think it's going to be delicious nothing here for you to eat dude this is butt head guys butthead is a sweetheart she wants to be rubbed on her head and she wants to right here and loves to like push back at you what a butt head there isn't anything in there that wasn't in there just a minute ago 47 is the sweetie poo that that stayed over there yo man you got any food what's up what's up with these buckets you know what i'm saying i need some food i need some food i need some love where my food at dog excuse me excuse me everybody excuse me pardon me excuse me pardon me don't kick this wind is horrible dude i swear i'm itching now i need to get on the scratch and snug what you looking at fool i pity the fool don't bring me hey the wind's blowing 873 miles an hour now i'm just waiting on wind bro the wind is blowing 9 000 miles an hour waiting on the wind look at this ding dong knock it over dude you got to knock it over just knock it over i know you need to knock it over there you go go ahead knock it over got to get it on the ground then step on it for me here comes here it comes he's going to knock it over now look at this hairdo man homeboy's got an afro it's awesome knock it over go ahead hey guys why don't you knock my tripod over cows are literally destroying the four-wheeler up there wish i had a button i could push start it who knows that's right it's more time