During April, foot-and-mouth disease still dominated disease discussions, but several other important seasonal disease trends also increased.

The continued wet conditions across many parts of the country, followed by colder winter-like temperatures, created favourable conditions for both parasite-related and respiratory disease challenges.

In sheep, wireworm remained the number one disease problem, while increasing cases of pulpy kidney and lameness/foot problems were also reported. The combination of lush grazing conditions, high parasite burdens and deworming of affected sheep likely contributed to this increase in cases during April.

In cattle, blue tick numbers remained unusually high late into the season, together with the associated cases of tick-borne diseases such as Asiatic redwater, African redwater and anaplasmosis.

Pneumonia cases have started increasing, particularly in sheep, and this trend is expected to continue during the colder winter months ahead.