It's Fly Time
/With a combination of heat and moisture the danger zone for fly is now upon us.
If you are getting fly strike, stop and have a think about why there are struck sheep:
Are they uncrutched and offering smelly dirty bums to interested flies?
Lambs missed a drench?
Could a preventative dip have been done sooner and more efficiently?
When were they last dipped and was the dip applied correctly?
The best and most cost-effective approach to prevent flystrike is to use a combination of strategies that keep sheep as unattractive to flies as possible.
1 No fly chemical works in dags
Preventing sheep becoming daggy is vital.
Have a robust worm control programme using an effective drench to reduce scouring. Don’t extend drench intervals unless you are monitoring with FEC.
Crutch or shear to remove dags and allow the crutch to dry out.
Grazing high tannin crops or clean pasture results in less dags.
2 Reduce fly challenge
Keep sheep away from fly hotspots.
Flies love sheltered conditions such as shelter belts and gullies with scrub. Move sheep to higher open ground where the temperatures are cooler, and the wind speed is higher.
Get dead carcases down the offal hole as quickly as possible.
3 Chemical application
Faulty application is often to blame for poor fly results following dipping
For saturation dips to be effective the sheep must be wet to skin level along the backline, over the rump and around the crutch. Pushing large numbers of sheep quickly through the jetting race is often to blame for inadequate coverage. When the first pen of sheep has been through the jetting race, stop and part the wool at multiple sites to ensure the skin is wet.
