Calves with Sam

Don't try to use disinfectants to clean up a manure spreader!

Of course, the title of this blog sounds crazy. We would not go out and spray a manure spreader with a disinfectant - makes no sense at all.

For a review of disinfectants, their characteristics and use click this link: Center for Food Security and Public Health . They have two great tables that summarize lots of information: (1) Characteristics of Selected Disinfectants and (2) The antimicrobial spectrum of disinfectatants. And, there is a one-page protocol that captures all the principles of effective disinfection.

Why talk about this? Because on last Thursday I had a working discussion with dairy producers about cleaning calf feeding equipment. Several of them were cleaning their equipment by "washing" them in a disinfectant solution - not too much different than trying to clean a manure spreader!

The bottles, pails and tube feeders were not rinsed before going into the disinfectant solution.

This equipment did not come in contact with a hot chlorinated detergent solution. How else to remove the milk fat and proteins?

With all the build up of biofilms containing fat and protein on calf feeding equipment there is no way that the expensive disinfectants can effectively kill pathogens.

An effective washing protocol is at www.calffacts.com (also in Spanish and French). Click HERE for the English version. Once the equipment is washed and detergent rinsed away, then equipment can be immersed in a disinfectant solution for the required length of time to get the desired kill.

Bottom line? You cannot expect to get rid of pathogens by washing calf feeding equipment with a disinfectant solution any more than you can do the same with a manure spreader!