USDA Announces Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza in Dairy Cattle

Apr 01, 2024

In late March, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced the detection of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) in milk and nasal swabs collected from dairy cattle in Texas and Kansas. All four dairies had cows that were exhibiting symptoms consistent with a syndrome that has been affecting dairy cattle in the Texas panhandle, New Mexico, and Kansas since early February.

At this stage, there is no concern about the safety of the commercial milk supply or that this circumstance poses a risk to consumer health. Dairies are required to send only milk from healthy animals into processing for human consumption; milk from impacted animals is being diverted or destroyed so that it does not enter the food supply. In addition, pasteurization has continually proven to inactivate bacteria and viruses, like influenza, in milk.

While no cases have been reported in Oregon, the Oregon Department of Agriculture (ODA) is working closely with partners from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW), Oregon Health Authority (OHA), and USDA, as well as Oregon livestock industry leaders to provide information to Oregon livestock producers, and develop plans to respond if a suspected case is reported in Oregon.

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Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

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