2 mistakes that could lead to your farm equipment making your livestock sick
There are some mistakes that could potentially result in your farm equipment making your livestock sick. Here are a couple of examples of these mistakes.
1. Putting your molasses tanks in or near the fields where your animals graze
It makes sense to put the molasses tanks in which you store the molasses that your livestock eats in a place which is not too far away from where these animals spend most of their time. However, putting this equipment too close to them could potentially lead to them becoming very ill.
The reason for this is that whilst you might think that if the tanks are properly sealed, the animals won't be able to gain access to the food stored inside them, this is not necessarily true. If a hole forms in the tank or if the tank's outlet develops a defect, molasses could leak out. If this happens when you are busy doing work elsewhere on the farm, and the tank in question is in or next to the field where your livestock is located, these animals could eat the molasses that are seeping out of the tank.
Because a lot of farm animals will often eat far beyond the point of fullness, this could be very dangerous. Cows, for instance, can sometimes eat until their stomachs burst open; when this happens, it usually results in them dying. As such, if this situation were to occur, you would probably have to have a vet make an emergency call-out, in order to pump the stomachs of the livestock who had overeaten the leaking molasses. Given this, it is best to avoid placing the tanks too close to your livestock.
2. Not disinfecting the livestock's drinking troughs regularly
Another mistake which could result in your livestock getting sick is failing to regularly disinfect their drinking troughs. This error is sometimes made because farmers mistakenly believe that their troughs are cleaned by the act of pouring out the old drinking water and replacing it with fresh water each day.
The truth is that, due to the fact that this equipment is constantly wet, it is the optimal breeding ground for waterborne pathogens that could make your animals severely ill when they drink from the troughs. The only way to stop these pathogens from contaminating the drinking water and harming your farm animals is to disinfect the troughs regularly.
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