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Show Vaccination of Calves Checks Bang's Disease Immune Heifers Obtained Through This Process Because of the war and the desire de-sire to step up milk production in line with the Food for Freedom program, pro-gram, dairy farmers have adopted calfhood vaccination as a means of controlling Bang's disease more quickly than they would have in ordinary or-dinary times. Calfhood vaccination makes it possible for herd owners to replace old, unprofitable cows with heifers immune from brucellosis, or Bang's disease, Dr. George E. Taylor, extension ex-tension dairyman at Rutgers university, uni-versity, reminds herd owners. However, How-ever, the answer to the question of whether vaccination is the best method of controlling the disease, depends upon many things, Dr. Taylor Tay-lor says. "As an example, U. S. department depart-ment of agriculture officials point to many farmers who have tried the test - and - slaughter method and have not been able to eliminate the disease from their herds completely," he reports. re-ports. "These farmers frequently frequent-ly are in communities where brucellosis is prevalent. And in all probability, calfhood vacci- nation would be recommended. "On the other hand, a farmer may have only one or two cases of brucellosis bru-cellosis in his herd. If he lives in '" "?-'. This small herd, part of a larger one, is the kind that has to be watclied for any outbreak of the dreaded Bang's disease. a community which is comparatively comparative-ly free from the disease, he and his advisers often conclude that the best thing to do is to get rid of the reacting re-acting animals, make a thorough clean-up, and then keep close watch for any reappearance of the trouble. "Also, there are circumstances circum-stances which lead farmers to adopt a combination of calfhood vaccination and test-and-slaugh-ter methods in their control of brucellosis." So if you have brucellosis or Bang's disease in your herd, talk the matter over with your livestock sanitary officials, veterinarian, and your county agricultural agent, suggests sug-gests Dr. Taylor. |