Preventing hardware disease in cows: 5 tips

Every year, hardware disease costs many cows their health or even their lives. According to Wageningen University & Research (WUR), in the Netherlands alone it involves about 4,000 dead and 12,000 injured cows a year. The cause is almost always a piece of metal that gets into the cow through the feed. With a few fixed habits, you keep that metal out of your feed.

What is hardware disease in a cow?

Hardware disease (traumatic reticuloperitonitis) happens when a sharp metal object gets into the cow's reticulum. Because of the way this stomach contracts, the object can pierce a hole in the stomach wall.

In mild cases, the cow eats less for a while and milk production drops. In severe cases, the outcome is usually fatal. Then, as well as the stomach wall, the pericardium, liver, lungs or diaphragm are damaged.

How does metal get into the feed?

The metal mainly comes in through the feed: litter in the grass, parts that come loose from machinery, rubbish in the yard and steel wire from old tyres on the silage pit.

Can tyres on the silage pit cause hardware disease?

Yes. Tyres have steel wire woven into them. As a tyre slowly breaks down, that wire comes loose and can end up in your silage. In post-mortems in Flanders (Belgium), 71.4% of hardware disease cases could be traced back to metal from worn tyres (DGZ Vlaanderen, the Flemish animal health service).

If you cover your silage without tyres, you reduce the risk of steel wire from tyres in the feed. With Silage Safe, covers with tensioning straps hold the plastic in place. See how that works on our product information page.

5 tips to prevent hardware disease

1. Clear litter from your fields before you mow. Pay special attention to strips next to a road or cycle path. Do it before mowing, because the mower can shred objects into many razor-sharp metal particles. Some diet feeders have a magnet that picks up metal, but not all metals are magnetic. A magnet doesn't pick up aluminium cans, for example.
2. Check the magnet on your diet feeder and clean it. If the magnet is full, it attracts new objects less well.
3. Maintain and check your machinery. Replace parts in time, before they can come loose. Think of the blades of your silage facer or mower and the tines of your tedder or rake. Brush bristles are sometimes made of metal too.
4. Keep your yard clean. Don't leave screws or nails lying around and replace old barbed wire.
5. Stop using tyres on your silage pit. That way no steel wire from old tyres gets into your silage. See how covering without tyres works on our product information page.

What should you look out for when feeding out?

When feeding out, all the feed passes through your hands once more. When you open a section, check whether there are remains of tyres, wire or other waste on or in the silage, and remove it before it goes into the diet feeder. How many metres a week to feed out is explained in silage feed-out rate.

A well-covered pit also keeps out other trouble, such as pests at your silage pit. More about covering well is in covering a silage pit.

Would you like to look at how to reduce the risk of hardware disease on your farm together with us? Get in touch.