1The aims of this study were to update the prevalence of lameness in sheep in England 2 and identify novel risk factors. A total of 1260 sheep farmers responded to a postal 3 survey. The survey captured detailed information on the period prevalence of 4 lameness from May 2012 -April 2013 and the prevalence and farmer naming of 5 lesions attributable to interdigital dermatitis (ID), severe footrot (SFR), contagious 6 ovine digital dermatitis (CODD) and shelly hoof (SH), management and treatment 7 of lameness, and farm and flock details. 8The global mean prevalence of lameness fell between 2004 and 2013 from 10.6% to 9 4.9% and the geometric flock mean period prevalence of lameness fell from 5.4% 10 (95% CL: 4.7-6.0%) to 3.5% (95% CI: 3.3%-3.7%). In 2013, more farmers were 11 using vaccination and antibiotic treatment for ID and SFR and fewer farmers were 12 using foot trimming as a routine or in therapeutic treatment than in 2004. 13Two over-dispersed Poisson regression models were developed with the outcome the 14 period prevalence of lameness, one investigated associations with farmer estimates of 15 prevalence of the four foot lesions and one investigated associations with 16 management practices to control and treat lameness and footrot. A prevalence of ID 17 >10%, SFR >2.5% and CODD >2.5% were associated with a higher prevalence of 18 lameness compared with those lesions being absent, however, the prevalence of SH 19was not associated with a change in risk of lameness. 20 A key novel management risk associated with higher prevalence of lameness was the 21 rate of feet bleeding / 100 ewes trimmed / year. In addition, vaccination of ewes once 22 per year and selecting breeding replacements from never-lame ewes were associated 23 with a decreased risk of lameness. Other factors identified as associated with a lower 24 3 risk of lameness, for the first time in a random sample of farmers and a full risk 25 model, were recognising lameness in sheep at locomotion score 1 compared with 26 higher scores, treatment of the first lame sheep in a group compared with >5, 27 treatment of lame sheep within 3 days, ease of catching lame sheep and quarantine 28 for >21 days. A previously known factor associated with a lower risk of lameness 29 was footbathing to prevent ID. We conclude that the prevalence of lameness in sheep 30 in England has fallen and that this might be in part because of increased uptake of 31 managements previously reported as beneficial to control lameness. Routine foot 32 trimming should be avoided. 33 4

Footrot is an infectious bacterial disease of sheep that causes lameness. The causal agent is Dichelobacter nodosus. There is debate regarding the role of Fusobacterium necrophorum in disease initiation. This research used an observational longitudinal study of footrot, together with quantitative PCR (qPCR) of bacterial load of D. nodosus and F. necrophorum, to elucidate the roles of each species in the development of disease. All feet of 18 a priori selected sheep were monitored for five weeks assessing disease severity (healthy, interdigital dermatitis (ID) and severe footrot (SFR)) and bacterial load. A multinomial model was used to analyse these data.Key unadjusted results were that D. nodosus was detected more frequently on feet with ID, whereas F. necrophorum was detected more frequently on feet with SFR. In the multinomial model, ID was associated with increasing log10 load of D. nodosus the week of observation (OR = 1.28 (95% CI = 1.08–1.53)) and the week prior to development of ID (OR = 1.20 (95% CI = 1.01–1.42). There was no association between log10 load2 of F. necrophorum and presence of ID (OR = 0.99 (95% CI = 0.96–1.02))). SFR was associated with increasing log10 load of D. nodosus the week before disease onset (OR = 1.42 (95% CI = 1.02–1.96)) but not once SFR had occurred. SFR was positively associated with log10 load2 of F. necrophorum once disease was present (OR = 1.06 (95% CI = 1.01–1.11)). In summary, there was an increased risk of increasing D. nodosus load the week prior to development of ID and SFR and during an episode of ID. In contrast, F. necrophorum load was not associated with ID before or during an episode, and was only associated with SFR once present. These results contribute to our understanding of the epidemiology of footrot and highlight that D. nodosus load plays the primary role in disease initiation and progression, with F. necrophorum load playing a secondary role. Further studies in more flocks and climates would be useful to confirm these findings. This study identifies that D. nodosus load is highest during ID. This supports previous epidemiological findings, which demonstrate that controlling ID is the most effective management strategy to prevent new cases of ID and SFR.

Background: Internationally, foot trimming is used by most farmers, and parenteral antibacterials by some, to treat sheep with footrot. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID) are sometimes used. No clinical trials have compared these treatments.Objectives: To investigate the above treatments on time to recovery from lameness and foot lesions in sheep with footrot. Animals: Fifty-three sheep with footrot on a commercial farm in England. Methods: In a randomized factorial design, the sheep were allocated to 6 treatment groups. The treatments were oxytetracycline spray to all sheep (positive control) and one or more of parenteral administration of long-acting oxytetracycline, flunixine meglumine, and foot trimming on day 1 or 6 of diagnosis. Follow-up was for 15 days. Time to recovery from lameness and lesions was investigated with discrete-time survival models.Results: There was significant association (P o .05) between recovery from lameness and lesions. Sheep receiving antibacterials parenterally recovered faster from lameness (odds ratio [OR] Conclusions and Clinical Importance: If foot trimming on day 1 or 6 of diagnosis was stopped and parenteral antibacterials were used, then over 1 million sheep/annum lame with footrot in the United Kingdom would recover more rapidly with benefits to productivity. Globally, this figure would be much higher.

Automated behavioural classification and identification through sensors has the potential to improve health and welfare of the animals. Position of a sensor, sampling frequency and window size of segmented signal data has a major impact on classification accuracy in activity recognition and energy needs for the sensor, yet, there are no studies in precision livestock farming that have evaluated the effect of all these factors simultaneously. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of position (ear and collar), sampling frequency (8, 16 and 32 Hz) of a triaxial accelerometer and gyroscope sensor and window size (3, 5 and 7 s) on the classification of important behaviours in sheep such as lying, standing and walking. Behaviours were classified using a random forest approach with 44 feature characteristics. The best performance for walking, standing and lying classification in sheep (accuracy 95%, F-score 91%-97%) was obtained using combination of 32 Hz, 7 s and 32 Hz, 5 s for both ear and collar sensors, although, results obtained with 16 Hz and 7 s window were comparable with accuracy of 91%-93% and F-score 88%-95%. Energy efficiency was best at a 7 s window. This suggests that sampling at 16 Hz with 7 s window will offer benefits in a real-time behavioural monitoring system for sheep due to reduced energy needs.

1In 2004, 3000 questionnaires were sent to a random sample of English sheep farmers from a 2 list kept by the English Beef and Lamb Executive (EBLEX) to investigate whether farmers 3 could correctly name six common foot lesions in sheep from a characteristic picture and a 4 written description. The lesions were interdigital dermatitis (ID), footrot (FR), contagious 5 ovine digital dermatitis (CODD), shelly hoof, foot abscess and toe granuloma. In addition, 6 farmers were asked to report the total percent of lame sheep in their flock in 2004 and the 7 percent of this lameness attributable to each of the six lesions listed above. The overall 8 response percentage was 44 with a useable response of 32%. 9Fifty nine farmers out of 262 (23%) who answered all six questions named all six lesions 10 correctly. This was greater than expected by chance. The same questionnaire of six lesions 11 was presented at a meeting of specialist sheep advisors, primarily veterinarians, 37/47 (79%) 12 responders named all six lesions correctly. 13From the six lesions listed above, the percent correctly named by farmers was approximately 14 83%, 85%, 36%, 28%, 65% and 43% and the percent incorrectly attributed to another lesion 15 was 5%, 47%, 10%, 13%, 35% and 7% respectively. The most commonly used incorrect 16 name was FR, with farmers tending to name any hoof horn lesion as FR. A comparison of 17 the distribution of sheep lame by a lesion correctly named compared with the same lesion 18 incorrectly named as FR suggested that farmers recognised lesions but did not name them 19 correctly; the distribution of lameness fitted the pattern for the correctly named lesion rather 20 than the pattern of lameness attributed to FR. The results were validated with farm visits and 21 a repeatability study of the questionnaire. 22The mean farmer-estimated prevalence for all lameness was 10.4%; with 6.9%, 3.7%, 2.4%, 231.9%, 0.9% and 0.8% of the sheep lame with ID, FR, CODD, shelly hoof, foot abscess and 24 toe granuloma respectively from respondents who correctly named these lesions. Whilst ID 25 3 and FR were the most prevalent causes of lameness in most flocks it is possible that in up to 1 17% flocks the primary cause of lameness was a different lesion. 2 Keywords: foot lesions; sheep; repeatability; validity; lameness; footrot 3 4 Introduction 5Lameness in sheep has been identified by sheep farmers in GB as their highest cause of 6 concern for poor health in the flock (Goddard et al., 2006). There is no evidence that the 7 incidence or prevalence of lameness in sheep in GB has decreased in the last 30 years despite 8 recommendations for its control. In 1994, the estimated prevalence was 8% (Grogono-9Thomas and Johnston, 1997) and in 2000 it was 10% (Wassink et al., 2003(Wassink et al., , 2004. The most 10 common infectious causes of lameness in sheep are interdigital dermatitis (ID) and footrot 11 (FR) (Grogono-Thomas and Johnston, 1997) and more recently concern has been raised over 12 the newly emerging infectious disease, contagio...

A 2009 UK Government report on veterinary expertise in food animal production highlighted that there was insufficient herd health expertise among veterinarians and lack of appropriate business models to deliver veterinary services to the livestock sector. Approximately two thirds of sheep farmers only contact their veterinarian for emergencies and one fifth have all year round contact. The aim of the current study was to understand sheep farmers’ perception, the current and future role of veterinarians in flock health management using qualitative methodology. The eligibility criteria were male farmers with a flock size of at least 200 adult sheep. Seven focus groups of farmers (n = 45) stratified by three regions and two age groups (≤50 and >50) were conducted. Thematic analysis of the discussions indicated that most farmers considered and used their veterinarian as a fire-fighter, whilst other advice was gathered free of charge when the veterinarian was on the farm for other reasons (typically seeing cattle) or by telephone. A small group of farmers were using their veterinarian or a sheep consultant proactively with regular contact and found this financially beneficial. Farmers indicated that the key barriers to using a veterinarian proactively were inconsistent service, high turnover of veterinarians, lack of expertise of sheep farming among veterinarians and concern about independence of advice. Although economics was also mentioned as a key barrier to using veterinarians more proactively, most farmers did not know where they gained and lost income from their flock; there was heavy reliance on the single farm payment scheme (SPS) and very few farmers kept records from which they could investigate where there were inefficiencies in production. Overall sheep farmers considered sheep farming complex and that each farm was unique and that they themselves were the experts to manage their flock. We conclude that there is an impasse: veterinarians might need to provide consistency and wide expertise beyond knowledge of disease and a model of how flock planning would be financially beneficial but until sheep farmers keep production records flock health planning cannot be rigorous and the financial benefits cannot be evaluated. Given the reliance on SPS by farmers an alternative model would be to require farmers to keep production records to comply with SPS. This might lead to flock health planning being adopted at a faster rate and so develop the UK sheep industry and make it more environmentally sustainable by reducing waste from disease and low productivity.

Responsibility for biosecurity in UK farming is being devolved from government to industry, with a greater emphasis on the veterinarian (vet)‐farmer relationship. Although social science has shown that care for animals is part of ‘good farming’, the British dairy sector sees a need to improve biosecurity. This research uses the good farmer concept to compare how vets and dairy farmers define good farming for biosecurity based on qualitative interviews with 28 vets and 15 dairy farmers in England. The results revealed two conflicting ‘good farmer’ identities: the large, commercial farmer who has the economic capital to invest in biosecurity and veterinary services; and the self‐sufficient stock keeper whose cultural and social capital lead them to manage herd health independently. These identities reflect changing ‘rules of the game’, following Bourdieu's use of the term, and increasing penetration of vets’ cultural capital into the sector. They involve different constructions of risk which need to be recognised within debates about good biosecurity.

A seven point locomotion scoring scale ranging from 0 = normal locomotion 20 to 6 = unable to stand or move was developed. To test the between and within 21 observer reliability of the scale 65 movie clips of sheep with normal, and varying 22 degrees of abnormal, locomotion were made. Three observers familiar with sheep 23 locomotion were trained to read the videos. Thirty clips were randomly selected and 24 used to test the between and within observer agreement of these trained observers. 25There was high inter-(intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.93, weighted kappa 26 (κ w) = 0.93) and intra-observer (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.90, 27Weighted kappa (κ w ) = 0.91) reliability, with no evidence of observer bias. The main 28 differences between scores were for scores 0 (normal) and 1 (uneven posture and 29 shortened stride but no head movement). The results indicate that the locomotion 30 scoring scale using groups of defined observations for each point on the scale was 31 reliable and may be a useful research tool to identify and monitor locomotion in 32 individual sheep when used by trained observers. 33 34