Saskatchewan Cattlemen got more information last week on the CFIA’s Bovine Tuberculosis investigation.

Dr. Rick Davies is the Area Chief Inspector with CFIA for Western Canada.

He says provincially there are 7 premises involved, 4 producers in Southwest Saskatchewan are quarantined, and 3 in Alberta involving 1200 animals:

Davies said, "Two of those premises, are what we call the affected premises, happened to be owned by the same guy, he has cattle at two different locations. Four of them are then Trace-out herds which had a linkage to the event,

and then one would, what's called a direct contact low risk, so that's sort of like, fence line contact. These are of interest but are lower down on the list."

Two of the premises are considered infected premises which mean no movement of animals, equipment, and product while the other 5 premises just have an animal movement restriction.

Davis said, "The affected premises on those two, that's a complete quarantine of animals, equipment, and products. The others are simply animal movement. We are essentially finished the depopulation work on the affected premises

so now we are talking to those guys about cleaning and disinfection. There is a fallow period of 45 days where they do not restock, by that point, we will be able to talk to them about bringing cattle back in if that is their choice."

The two infected quarantine operations are the result of co-mingling on the two Alberta community pastures.

Davies says the Investigation now focuses on the trace-in, identifying where animals from the suspect herd in the last 5 years may have originated ie: auction marts, other producers.

So far about 650 animals have been ordered depopulated on Southwest Saskatchewan operations as a result of the Bovine TB investigation.

Davies says they are working on identifying where animals in the suspect herd may have come in from and then that group of producers will receive a letter about having their herd tested.

Davies said, "That will be followed up by a call from CFIA through what is called an epidemiologic questionnaire. So it's really, tell me about your farm, the way you manage your farm, the way you move animals. Part of that interview is

to confirm, Ya we got it right, we see the link to that farm.  Then the second phase of that is really to find a mutually beneficial but reasonable time to come to that farm and test."

He notes they expect the trace in testing will likely take place this fall.