Provita will be profiling Protect at Fintona. It is the first and only probiotic licensed for the prevention of calf scours in the UK.
Tommy Armstrong again:
One way of ensuring that all newborn calves get the required immunity booster they need is to administer Provita Protect.
“Recent, independent research has confirmed just how exposed newborn calves are to picking up disease. For example, on average, it will take a young calf up to three and a half hours to get its first suck. And before it even finds its mother’s teat it may well have already sucked her tail, leg and other body parts. As a result, the young calf will ingest large number of bugs – Salmonella, E Coli etc – before it receives one drop of colostrum.
He added:
“However, Protect, when administered to a calf within the first 30 seconds of life, serves to fill the young animal’s gut with billions of naturally occurring, beneficial bacteria. This helps to physically exclude harmful pathogens from attaching to the gut wall.”
“It is also crucially important for a young calf to get colostrum as soon as possible after birth,” he explained
Well known Co Down suckler farmer Sam Chesney agrees:
“Our calves receive Protect as soon as it is born. Experience with the product has confirmed that it significantly reduces the incidence of scours and in the event of any calf coming down with the problem, we have found that it is much easier cured. I would heartily recommend the use its use to any dairy or suckler herdowner,” he confirmed.