Farmer feels 'helpless' after bluetongue outbreak

A farmer said she felt "helpless" and considered selling up her farm after her entire herd of cattle was infected with the bluetongue virus (BVT).

Sally Phillips, co-owner of Burleaze Farm in Ilminster, Somerset, said the disease, which causes illness in cattle and is commonly fatal to sheep, severely limited milk production at her farm, costing around £11,000.

It comes after 350 farms in Somerset, 28 in Wiltshire, 18 in Gloucestershire and one in Bristol declared confirmed cases of the virus since July.

Phillips said: "It floored my husband and I. We were totally helpless."

Bluetongue virus (BTV) is an insect-borne viral disease affecting sheep and cattle among other animals.

It has been said to spread quickly this year due hot weather creating favourable conditions for transmission.

While potentially fatal to livestock, the disease does not affect humans.

Clinical symptoms among affected animals include fever, lameness, facial swelling, nasal discharge and mouth ulcers.

Previously, the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said BTV posed no threat to the public or food safety.

Phillips said she and her husband Nigel noticed some of the animals, who were unvaccinated against BTV, were struggling to walk at the beginning of August.

She said the symptoms included sore mouths, sore noses and not wanting to eat or drink, with a blood test later showing the cattle had BTV.

Phillips said: "We hold our hands up - we didn't know the severity of the disease and the knock-on effect on us mentally, physically and on the business for the next two years.

"We went from having six sick cows to our entire milking herd of 130," she said.

"We treated them with painkillers and anti-inflammatories, which I would point out was far more expensive than the bluetongue vaccine in the first place."

Phil Stocker, a sheep farmer from South Gloucestershire and chief executive of the National Sheep Association, said like Phillips, some farmers were weighing up the risk and the cost of vaccinating against BVT.

"There's no crime in that - farmers take a risk-based decision on these things and the messages were that bluetongue was going to be a real problem this year, but I think people were suspicious of that," he said.

He said the affect of the virus this year had been worse than expected, with people "caught out by what was effectively an explosion of the virus".

"In fairness to Defra [Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs] and APHA [Animal and Plant Health Agency] there were messages being put out about the risk of bluetongue taking off in a much bigger way this year, but it's hard to get that message to farmers on the ground.

"This year it didn't happen in a slow way where people could observe what was going on and take action - it just exploded and it caught lots of people out in terms of them not having vaccinated their stock," he added.

For cattle, vet Ed Powell, from Synergy Farm Health, a veterinary practice based in Somerset, Dorset and East Devon, said the disease was "relatively mild", with the biggest toll being the number of sheep dying.

"We had clients with multiple animals being found dead daily at the height of the outbreak," he said.

"Sheep farmers [in Exmoor] actually said it was worse than living through foot and mouth," said Mark Humphrey, the Somerset county chair for the National Farmers' Union (NFU).

"Every day they were going out and bringing in sick sheep and dead sheep," he added.

Powell said while they "are able to help remove symptoms of discomfort with painkillers and prevent secondary infections", they encourage all of their clients to get their livestock vaccinated "to make sure any future spread of the virus has few effects and is well-contained".

Director of George Farm Vets in Malmesbury, Gethin Roberts said the impact of the disease has also hit sheep fertility.

"There are a lot of sheep going to the ram at the moment and there's been a lot of rams fertility tested and a lot have failed," he said.

"So bluetongue has a negative impact on ram fertility as it causes a defect in the sperm morphology for up to 100 days - that could potentially affect people's lambing percentages next year," he added.

Phillips's husband, Nigel, said it had also impacted their cows from falling pregnant, delaying calving next year and reducing the amount of milk they produce in 2027.

"It's so much worse than I expected," he said.

"I expected some loss, but not that extent and it's come as a real shock," he added.

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