I have a doe and two kids (about a 6 weeks old). A few days ago one kid looked like she had the beginning of orf around her mouth (blister- not scab). Now it looks like the other kid has one spot and the doe and a few on her udder. But, we have never had orf so I am wondering if there is something that can look like it? A bacterial infection? We recently bought a weaned doe (about 3 weeks ago) that is in a pen that is close to the pen that the doe and kids are in, but the place were she came from did not currently have orf and she does not have any spots. From what I know about orf it has to be spread from animal to animal contact or feed/bedding contamination which we should not have since we have never had orf.
Orf?
- Thread starter JSMJ
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B&B Happy goats
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I hadn't heard of it and just looked it yp, was surprised it did not require treatment and would resolve on it own in one to four weeks....good luck 
Southern by choice
Herd Master
Orf or soremouth is very common in sheep. Most sheep producers don't bat an eye over it but Dairy goat folk sure do! 
Yet the studies say it is more common in goats, I think it is meatgoats more so.
But...it is highly contagious. Wear gloves, wash your hands. IOW it is zoonotic.
Your biggest issue is making sure kids can still nurse, it apparently is painful both for dam, and kids.
I know a few people whose sheep had it, no first hand experience with it myself.
There are quite a few good articles about Orf, which you may have already read but I'll post a few links anyway.
@Ridgetop not sure you ever had dealings with this but you have had livestock for so long I thought you may be able to offer some advice.
https://www.sheepandgoat.com/soremouth
https://www.texvetpets.org/article/contagious-ecthyma-orf/
Yet the studies say it is more common in goats, I think it is meatgoats more so.
But...it is highly contagious. Wear gloves, wash your hands. IOW it is zoonotic.
Your biggest issue is making sure kids can still nurse, it apparently is painful both for dam, and kids.
I know a few people whose sheep had it, no first hand experience with it myself.
There are quite a few good articles about Orf, which you may have already read but I'll post a few links anyway.
@Ridgetop not sure you ever had dealings with this but you have had livestock for so long I thought you may be able to offer some advice.
https://www.sheepandgoat.com/soremouth
https://www.texvetpets.org/article/contagious-ecthyma-orf/
Baymule
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I believe it was @Sheepshape who got orf from her sheep.
Sheepshape
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Good memory, Baymule....and spot on (in fact a great big spot on the ring finger of my left hand). It started as a small sore area on the middle joint of the finger and rapidly developed into a very painful pustule which lasted for 6 weeks. (Orf is prevalent around here, and is due to a paradox virus). My finger swelled hugely, and I had to have my rings sawn off at the local hospital.
In addition to the pustule, I developed a generalised itchy body rash called erythema multiforme which is an auto-immune condition and is relatively common in orf. It itched , scabbed and eventually healed without scarring.
The scabs from orf can remain infective for a number of years, so you don't have to be aware of a problem in a particular area for your animals to go down with it.
Thankfully, most orf is fairly mild, though newborns who develop it may have a mouth too sore to suckle, or the mother with lesions on her udder finds suckling too painful.
As Southern says....VERY contagious. Were gloves at all times you are in contact with this trio....the lesions do start as blisters and progress to scabs (much like chicken pox).An iodine-based spray should help to keep secondary infection at bay, and most orf clears within 2-3 weeks. However, I would suggest that observing it in your animals is more than enough to get the 'Orf Experience' and personal involvement is totally unnecessary.
Ridgetop
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I have never had it on my property - very lucky and knock wood! Very contagious! And as Southern and Sheepshape said, humans can catch it so wear gloves and do not come in physical contact with the pustules or exudations. Wear gloves and disinfect the shovels after cleaning the stalls and corrals. I also recommend cleaning the pen with bleach or lime heavily to try to disinfect the pen after the infected animals have recovered and can be removed. I don't think it will kill the orf virus but if it is another type of infection it will help.
We checked into vaccinating against it 15 years ago when there was a large outbreak in the next county. We had dairy goats as well as sheep at the time and were actively showing our goats and sheep. Some sheep people do vaccinate for it. The vaccine is a live vaccine. Since the vaccine is live, once you vaccinate your herd it transfers or sheds into your soil and your property will now have the orf virus in the soil. So if you have never had soremouth on your property, you don't want to vaccinate for it. Once you have it on your property, you only vaccinate those herd members who haven't gotten it (usually lambs) since once the animal has it and recovers, I believe it confers immunity.
There are other conditions that resemble soremouth as well. Are you sure that this is definitely soremouth? I am not sure if there is any sort of test your vet can do to determine whether or not it is really orf. But if he/she can look at the exudate under a microscope and determine what it is, it might be worth the cost of the test. If it is orf, you might want to consider vaccinating your other animals from now on. On the other hand, if it is not orf or soremouth, you do not want to vaccinate. (live vaccine = soil contamination)
Three lambings ago I had a ewe and her 2 kids start what I feared was soremouth. I sent a photo to a friend sheep breeder and she said it did not look like soremouth. I waited to see if any other ewes and lambs got it but no one else did even though they were living in the same pen and eating and drinking from the same feeder and bucket. Since then we have used the same lambing pens for our sheep and no other sheep have gotten anything resembling it.
My advice is to take all precautions for soremouth, and let the blisters heal up. Watch the other doe for signs of it developing. It she develops the same thing, it may be soremouth. Since the animals are immune to another attack once they recover from this I would wait to see if you get any ore cases in your herd before deciding to vaccinate.
Blisters on the udder can also be goat pox. Our first dairy goat (a precocious milker) developed goat pox and freaked me out until I realized what it was. She had blisters on her udder, but since she was not nursing kids, I don't know if they would have developed blisters on their mouths. Goat pox is a virus.
In any case, hopefully it is just some sort of weird rash and not orf. Either way, orf is not life threatening as long as the babies can nurse. If they can't or won't drink, or the ewe won't let them nurse because her udder is too sore, you will have to pull them and bottle feed them. Keep checking to make sure they look full, and they all should heal up in about a month.
We checked into vaccinating against it 15 years ago when there was a large outbreak in the next county. We had dairy goats as well as sheep at the time and were actively showing our goats and sheep. Some sheep people do vaccinate for it. The vaccine is a live vaccine. Since the vaccine is live, once you vaccinate your herd it transfers or sheds into your soil and your property will now have the orf virus in the soil. So if you have never had soremouth on your property, you don't want to vaccinate for it. Once you have it on your property, you only vaccinate those herd members who haven't gotten it (usually lambs) since once the animal has it and recovers, I believe it confers immunity.
There are other conditions that resemble soremouth as well. Are you sure that this is definitely soremouth? I am not sure if there is any sort of test your vet can do to determine whether or not it is really orf. But if he/she can look at the exudate under a microscope and determine what it is, it might be worth the cost of the test. If it is orf, you might want to consider vaccinating your other animals from now on. On the other hand, if it is not orf or soremouth, you do not want to vaccinate. (live vaccine = soil contamination)
Three lambings ago I had a ewe and her 2 kids start what I feared was soremouth. I sent a photo to a friend sheep breeder and she said it did not look like soremouth. I waited to see if any other ewes and lambs got it but no one else did even though they were living in the same pen and eating and drinking from the same feeder and bucket. Since then we have used the same lambing pens for our sheep and no other sheep have gotten anything resembling it.
My advice is to take all precautions for soremouth, and let the blisters heal up. Watch the other doe for signs of it developing. It she develops the same thing, it may be soremouth. Since the animals are immune to another attack once they recover from this I would wait to see if you get any ore cases in your herd before deciding to vaccinate.
Blisters on the udder can also be goat pox. Our first dairy goat (a precocious milker) developed goat pox and freaked me out until I realized what it was. She had blisters on her udder, but since she was not nursing kids, I don't know if they would have developed blisters on their mouths. Goat pox is a virus.
In any case, hopefully it is just some sort of weird rash and not orf. Either way, orf is not life threatening as long as the babies can nurse. If they can't or won't drink, or the ewe won't let them nurse because her udder is too sore, you will have to pull them and bottle feed them. Keep checking to make sure they look full, and they all should heal up in about a month.
Sheepshape
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If you could take pics. of the lesions JSMJ, now that they have had some time to develop, this would help.
Due to the technical difficulties with vaccination (and animals therefore still getting orf) we gave up. Locally farmers place chunks of Himalayan rock salt in the field which animals lick and dry up the lesions in order to avoid secondary infection.
I hope that I am not tempting fate here, but most cases I have had in recent years have been pretty mild. I have sprayed the blisters with an iodine based spray and used gloves, separate feeding bottles, and isolation if they are cade lambs.
You are right, ridge top, and we used to do so. Unfortunately the delivery system is unreliable....the 'tool' has two sharp prongs designed to make a scratch in the armpit of the animal whilst depressing the vaccine bottle to deliver 0.2 mls of the vaccine. I used to find that most of the animals just had an armpit scratch whilst one or two had a big blue line of vaccine.
Due to the technical difficulties with vaccination (and animals therefore still getting orf) we gave up. Locally farmers place chunks of Himalayan rock salt in the field which animals lick and dry up the lesions in order to avoid secondary infection.
I hope that I am not tempting fate here, but most cases I have had in recent years have been pretty mild. I have sprayed the blisters with an iodine based spray and used gloves, separate feeding bottles, and isolation if they are cade lambs.
Ridgetop
Herd Master
I think a lot of people may have stopped vaccinating for it Like I said, if you don't have it you don't want to vaccinate because you will have to vaccinate every year, and if you already have it why vaccinate when the infected animals will recover and be immune?
I forgot to say that I heard it mostly appears in the spring, so probably wet weather must wake up the dormant virus.
I forgot to say that I heard it mostly appears in the spring, so probably wet weather must wake up the dormant virus.
Baymule
Herd Master
Why use a live virus? Why not use a killed virus? It seems counter productive to vaccinate and infect your farm.
Ridgetop
Herd Master
I am not sure, but for some reason the only vaccine available was a live vaccine. Possibly a killed vaccine didn't work. Or it could be like some other vaccines - they give you a mild case to activate your antibodies. If the vaccinated sheep are getting a mild case then the virus would shed into the soil and then remain active. That is one reason why we never bothered to vaccinate. Since we never had it on our property, we didn't want to bring it in by vaccinating. If you have a problem with it on your land already, and have a large commercial flock, you might want to vaccinate newborns to avoid getting it. If they get the lesions on their mouths too bad, or the ewes get lesions on their udders too bad, the lambs won't nurse or the ewes kick them away. The result is the same, a bunch of starved lambs and a big financial loss.
