The response of cattle and sheep to feed contaminated with rodent faeces

On farms where rats and mice are present, unprotected livestock feed may become contaminated with rodent faeces, thereby creating a possible source of infection for cattle and sheep. Livestock unable to avoid contaminated feed may choose to eat it entirely, reject it completely or attempt to reject faeces selectively while consuming some of the feed. Two experiments were conducted to investigate which of these three responses were demonstrated by livestock. Ten cattle and ten sheep were presented individually with three repeats of ten feed treatments. Treatments were based on two feed types (meal and pelleted compound), with three levels of contamination (none, 'low' and 'high'), from one of two rodent species (rat and mouse). Avoidance behaviour was greater for feed contaminated with rat faeces compared to feed contaminated with mouse faeces. At low levels of rat contamination there was evidence that livestock actively rejected faeces whilst consuming feed. At higher levels of contamination animals rejected faeces and feed. Livestock could not actively discriminate against mouse faeces and thus rejection of feed was used to avoid faeces ingestion. Despite rejection of contaminated feed and some discrimination against faeces, significant numbers of rodent faeces were ingested illustrating that livestock feeding behaviour cannot prevent ingestion of rodent faeces. Feed contaminated with rodent faeces therefore poses a significant risk of disease infection to livestock.