STRATFORD, Wis. – There are few times more stressful for a dairy farmer than when an animal is involved in a dangerous situation that is out of the farmer’s control. That stress can be compounded by emergency response personnel with limited knowledge of large livestock behavior and no understanding of how to help.
Helping remedy that situation was the goal of the Agriculture Incident Field Training Sept. 7 at the University of Wisconsin Marshfield Agricultural Research Station in Stratford. The training was sponsored by the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation District 8.
Law enforcement, firefighters and other emergency response personnel gathered to learn more about normal and high-stress behavior of livestock animals. The sessions were led by UW Extension agricultural educators Sandy Stuttgen and Heather Schlesser.
Schlesser said the behavior of livestock differs based on the situation.
“Animals that are involved in an emergency situation, like an accident or a tip, are very stressed,” Schlesser said. “Understanding that and having a plan developed and in place for dealing with those types of incidents before they happen is crucial.”
Stuttgen agreed and said a plan should include experts to contact in case of an emergency.
“Make contact with local veterinarians so that you have that network created before you have need of it in an emergency,” Stuttgen said. “There are some areas of Wisconsin where we don’t have as many large animal practitioners that might be available to serve on emergency response teams.”
Making that contact ahead of time will help emergency response personnel better handle the tough decisions that might need to be made, Stuttgen said.
“When it comes to needing to euthanize an animal on a scene, you really should get a veterinarian involved as soon as possible and let that person make that decision,” Stuttgen said. “You and I have really no concept of what the true value of that animal is in terms of dollars and cents or the emotional value. It is amazing what some people will pay to fix. With today’s veterinary technology, there might be an outside chance that an animal with a really bad broken leg, that years ago would have required euthanasia, might now be saved.”
Stuttgen also said insurance must be taken into consideration.
“Sometimes the insurance company will make a payout if a veterinarian made the decision to euthanize versus a layperson,” Stuttgen said.
Schlesser gave those in attendance advice on handling cattle.
“Cows are prey animals, and any prey animal has about a 300-degree field of vision with (a) blind spot directly behind them,” Schlesser said. “The flight zone for dairy cattle are typically small because they have been handled and been around people a lot. The more animals are handled, the smaller their flight zone gets. We use that flight zone to move our animals.”
Schlesser said to think of the shoulder area of the livestock as their pivot point or their steering wheel.
“If you want an animal to move backward, approach them from the front; to get the animal to move forward, approach them from the rear,” Schlesser said. “When I get into that flight zone, the animal will move in the direction that is away from me.”
Schlesser demonstrated using her arms to increase the size of her presence, making it easier to move the cattle. Stuttgen said zigzagging behind the animal to appear in both sides of their blind spot will help keep them headed in the desired direction.
While some emergency situations happen off the farm, often times those situations requiring emergency personnel that involve livestock happen on the farm, such as barn fires and structure collapses.
Because of that likelihood, Kyle Koshalek said emergency response personnel and farmers must work together to create emergency response plans and can do so by using technology.
Koshalek is the project manager for the National Farm Medicine Center’s Farm Mapping to Assist, Protect and Prepare Emergency Responders project.
“Farms are very complex,” Koshalek said. “They are dangerous and always changing. What you see on one farm is not necessarily what you will see at another. What you see at a particular farm one day is not necessarily what you will see at that same farm another day. We always say that when you have seen one farm, you have seen one farm.”
Koshalek listed large animals as potential on-farm hazards in addition to other hazards such as chemicals, fuels, confined spaces and lagoons, just to name a few.
Because of the differences from farm to farm and situation to situation, Koshalek stressed the importance of knowing the layout of a farm prior to an emergency situation to help ensure the safety of all involved.
“The most important thing is to keep yourself and everyone else safe,” Koshalek said. “The more information you can have going in to the situation, the safer you will be able to keep everyone.”
Koshalek said Farm MAPPER, an online tool, is a good way for farmers and emergency response personnel to be proactive at beginning the process of completing an on-farm emergency response plan.
“With so many people having such limited knowledge of modern-day, working farms and of how to handle large production livestock, having these response plans in place before an emergency situation presents itself can save a lot of time and hopefully a lot of additional stress,” Stuttgen said.
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