Reply #6: Ag department urges ranchers to report stranded, drowned cattle

[uppityperson]

http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/235564/group/home/

The North Dakota Department of Agriculture is urging livestock producers around the state to contact their county extension agents if any of their livestock have been lost or stranded in the recent flooding. This will allow state officials to plan animal rescue and carcass removal efforts and to get a handle on the number and type of disaster payments that might be claimed under the federal disaster declaration.
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Brian Zimprich, extension agent for North Dakota’s Ransom County, said the county has suffered heavy overland flooding. That’s bad news for county residents, but even worse news for beef cattle producers, who are in the middle of calving. “We have 50 head of cattle that have been lost due to flood, and there are various unofficial reports of livestock loss, rumored to have died due to flood or bad weather,” Zimprich said. Seventy-five to 100 calves have been lost, many to pneumonia, he said.

“Some of them were newborns and some probably a week or 2 weeks old that have come down with pneumonia or illnesses due to the extreme temperature changes and the wet conditions,” he said. “It’s just not the best situation for calving right now.” Zimprich said livestock animals often will make it safely to higher ground, but have no feed there.

“That was the case in Emmons County, (N.D.) where the water came up quickly and the animals were trapped on a mound,” Vollmer says. “There was some feed there, but it wasn’t enough for the number of days that the animals were out there.”