Foot baths can be transformative for the health of your cows and should be a regular part of your practice, but they must be carried out in the right way to be beneficial. Foot bathing is a simple way to protect your cows hooves and helps to prevent lameness and improve hoof health, which will save you time and money in treating lameness and dealing with problems.
Your foot bath practice can be an easy part of your animal care routine if done correctly, and we can help to simplify the process. Here, we’ll outline the best practices to follow and suggest some of the very best options to make life easier for you.
Cattle Foot Bath Best Practice
When you are caring for animals, streamlining your systems to create efficient practices can increase your profits as well as giving you more time and reducing stress. We suggest:
Start with cleanliness. Do you use a prewash bath to clean debris and dirt from hooves before your cattle enter the treatment bath? Your foot bath is designed to treat hooves and protect against specific bacteria, not to simply wash the feet, so it is vital to ensure that the treatment bath stays clean. A prewash foot bath is a popular system with many farmers but hosing their feet down before the cows enter the treatment bath will also be helpful. Most farmers will need to refresh their treatment solution between milkings.
Ensure your foot bath is long enough. There is little point in giving your cows a foot bath that cannot achieve the effect you want, so you need to make sure that your efforts will pay off. Cows must remain in the foot bath for at least 6-9 seconds, which means it needs to be long enough for them to take around three or four full steps in the bath, to ensure that all of their feet are immersed. Your foot bath should be wide enough to ensure that the hooves do not step around the solution rather than being immersed in it.
Dilute your solution correctly. You will be wasting your time if you dilute your foot bath solution too much, and a solution that is diluted less than the recommended amount will be ineffective. You should also avoid mixing a solution that is stronger than the manufacturer’s recommendations, since this will be expensive and could be harmful to your animals. You can avoid wasting treatment solutions by measuring your foot bath precisely and calculating the number of solutions you will need carefully.
Ensure comfort. While your cows are walking through your foot bath, they should be calm and comfortable. This is one of the major ways to avoid lameness in cattle, since stress can cause them to place their feet down in ways which are more dangerous to them. Cow flow can be improved by allowing your cows to move at their own pace and keeping floor level and free of debris.
Foot Bath Solutions
Choosing the right solution for your foot bath gives you peace of mind that your cows are getting the very best care. HealMax Footbath is an excellent way to control the spread of digital dermatitis (mortellaro) and does not use harsh acids or formaldehyde to achieve the desired results. This should be used at a rate of 2% dilution with water in the foot bath solution (2.5% in very cold weather) and should be carried out for 3 consecutive days for maintenance and 6 consecutive days for treatment purposes.
Hoofed Footbath & Spray Solution is an idea for manual and automatic foot baths, mats and sprays, and targets the specific bacteria that cause cows to develop disease and become lame. Hoofed has a low pH and is designed to be safe for humans and animals so there is no risk during application.
Hoof Care Solutions in Ireland at HoofCare Direct
At HoofCare Direct, we know that healthy animal care practices are the best way to protect your herd and your livelihood. We aim to support you with reliable products and advice, and we can recommend the options that will suit you and your animals best.
Our rollover crates are designed to make light work of hoof inspection and treatment and can change the way you practice forever. Take a look at the Inspect4 Mobile Hoof Trimming Crate and the Inspect4 Fixed Hoof Trimming Crate in action on our website and discover our extensive range of products for cattle hoof trimming, medications, maintenance and more. Give us a call today or contact us online to find out more.