acidosis in a steer?

[souNdguy]

steer onthe other side of fence of my cow pens died.. vet said acidosis. both the owner and i were curious about the COD as we both have more cows. any ideas what might have caused acidosis?
 

[JMOR]

[souNdguy]

he's got a couple high schoolers that come feed his cows, morning and night.

i reckon they overfed or fed too close together then...

not much grass to speak of here now..
 

[Dell (WA)]

B U R P P p p p ..........(sorry, couldn't resist) Need to put out more SALT blocks. (with pepto-bismol? giggle) .........Dell
 

[souNdguy]

salt.. hmm.. does it play a role in this?

I have brown salt blocks out for my cattle right now. occasionally when they are out I use the yellow sulfur salt. but have brown out now.

i don't see any salt in the neighbors pasture.

I use cargil / neutrina feeds mostly. he's using a local feed.. seminole.. but it's marked cattle.. not sure if it has trace minerals or not. never seen a bag tag.. etc.
 

[hurleyjd]

Go to the link reference below
Untitled URL Link

 

[Brian in MA]

Are they getting any hay, or just grain? I've heard of it as a problem with grain feeding cattle to "finish" them for market.
 

[Larharm]

Never heard of acidosis, if your neighbor has his cows where alfalfa is growing and can freeze this will cause them to bloat. When i raised cows did loose a few that way
 

[RodinNS]

Acidosis? Just remember... paying 100 bucks an hour for an opinion doesn't always mean it's right.
I'm no expert on the subject either... but I'd always understood acidosis to be a more long term condition caused by continious overfeeding of grain. I can't say I've even seen something so acute that it kills them unless they really got into a pile of grain and bloated? Just keep in mind that some vets are like some MD's... even if they don't know what the hell is wrong they've got to have some fancy sounding answer. Was this a vet that deals primarly with cattle or something else?

Rod
 

[souNdguy]

hay available sometimes but not where they can always get it..and yes.. I'd say he was finishing that one.
 

[souNdguy]

way too hot and dry to grow alfalfa here n fl
 

[souNdguy]

i'm not familiar with the vet.. he's not one of the 3 most of use on our equines.

i have heard the same about acidosis. usualy not an acute issue.. and I know I have broke bags inthe pasture and had a cow or steer hop on then and probably eath 10# of grain at one pop with no issues.

I know horses can founder fast on that type of thing.. but then.. wasn't a horse.
 

[Bob Jarvis]

Any symptoms observed?
 

[showcrop]

We had a high school kid feeding the sheep for us once when we were on vacation. On the first day he saw how aggressive they were to get at the grain so he decided that he ought to double the amount that we told him to feed.
 

[souNdguy]

primary symptom observed.. dead steer.

I didn't see it die.

ate 'breakfast' was fine at dinner.. ate dinner, next morning was dead when breakfast was served. hay was still in it's hay crib.