General advice for chickens

If you keep poultry as a hobby or as a smallholder we are here to help when your birds fall ill. If an individual chicken has fallen ill it is best to bring him/her into the surgery for examination and treatment, if your flock has fallen ill we can arrange a home visit.
If you feel you have an outbreak of disease spreading through your flock please give us a call to discuss the problem.
All chickens should be regularly wormed and treated for skin parasites and mites. To discuss your requirements for wormers, lice and mite treatment please give us a call. Please also note that certain medications carry a withdrawal period for eating eggs for human consumption, so this must be borne in mind when treating, but can be discussed with our vets.

Sheep

Pet sheep and small flocks are prone to the same diseases as our larger commercial flocks. Any poorly lambs can be brought to the surgery or we can visit to see multiple cases.
We advise speaking to our vets to develop a small flock health plan which will include a parasite control and monitoring programme [ worms and external mites/lice etc ] and also a vaccination programme. It is important to routinely vaccinate sheep against Clostridial diseases and Pasteurella.

Pigs

Backyard pigs can pick up all the diseases that their larger farm counterparts can develop so isolation from other units is advised.
Free range pigs are extremely prone to developing Erysipelas, a bacterial infection picked up from rooting in the soil so we strongly advise developing a vaccination programme with our vets to prevent this frequently fatal disease.

If you are planning to breed from your animals, it is always worth discussing vaccination for Porcine Parvovirus which can cause foetal loss. Our vets can risk assess this for you.
Pigs are susceptible to lice and mites so if your pigs are itching we can arrange a visit to assess and treat The most common worm found in the pig is the roundworm. We advise dropping a faeces sample to our surgery for anaylsis and egg count.

We strongly advise arranging a visit for one of our vets to develop a small pig herd health plan which will cover husbandry, vaccination and parasite control.

Camelids and Goats

We are experienced in dealing with these animals and recommend arranging a visit to develop a health plan. This will include husbandry advise, vaccinations and a parasite control plan. Regular worming for internal parasites is recommended as well as treatment for external parasites. We recommend vaccination against clostridial diseases, which can be discussed with our vets. Alpacas and Llamas require regular supplementation with vitamin D, which can be discussed.