BVD PI Testing

Have Your Cattle Tested Before They Get On The Truck

Have your cattle PI tested at R.H. Tompkins Livestock with our on site BVD PI lab. Within just a few hours after purchase you can have any BVD positive carriers removed from the rest of the herd, which is a tremendous health benefit for the load. The cost is $4.50 hd to have cattle PI tested.

Key things to remember about BVDV and persistent infection:

A persistently infected (PI) calf is born infected and remains infected for life, shedding virus at a tremendous rate. A single PI calf can rapidly spread infection throughout a herd, leading to elevated levels of BRD, reduced gains and feed efficiency, and a multitude of reproductive problems from poor conception rates to an increase in abortions, stillborns and weak, unthrifty calves.

Fortunately, BVDV testing can protect your operation.

BVDV testing is easy and cost-effective.

With an CST-QuickTest , a simple ear notch is all it takes to tell whether a calf is persistently infected with BVDV. The CST-QuickTest is the fastest ELISA test for BVDV

We do offer local BVD PI testing. Contact us today about testing your cattle for BVD PI. Let us help make sure your herd is BVD PI free.

In our on site BVD lab we can have test results in 30 minutes and we clear all cattle before they get on the truck.

"The benefit I see, first hand, is getting the PI animal off the group and is not shedding / exposing the rest of the cattle on the truck in transient to the customer. Getting the PI animal out of the group sooner helps the customer with the overall health of the cattle. I tell my customers they would benefit from testing because you don’t know when or where a PI will show up and by finding them and finding them sooner the less damage they can do to a group of cattle and that’s better than throwing a lot of antibiotics at a group of cattle. The CST QuickTest is very easy to run, we have used other test and the QuickTest is by far the simplest test to run, only 4 steps and we have results in less than 30 minutes. This really helps us when we are shipping cattle. We really like the QuickTest because it cuts down on the time in the lab and gives us very clear results." Mike Tompkins, Tompkins Livestock

Incidence and Prevalence Rate for BVD-PI in Feeder Operations

We compiled data from over 28,500 loads of cattle from 400 - 699 lbs to look at Incidence Rate. Incidence Rate is how often a

BVD-PI animal occurs by load. Some instances, the Incidence Rate is over 40%; meaning 40% of the incoming loads will have a PI on them. Averages by weight class are as shown:

400 - 499 lbs -- 32.27%
500 - 599 lbs -- 26.69%
600 - 699 lbs -- 22.03%

Below that is Prevalence Rate. This shows the percentage of PI's in the total number of cattle in their specific weight class, not by load. Some instances, the Prevalence Rate can be over 0.50%, meaning there are 5 PI's per 1,000 head of cattle. Averages by weight class are as shown:

400 - 499 lbs -- 0.49% or 4.9 PI's per 1,000 head
500 - 599 lbs -- 0.40% or 4 PI's per 1,000 head
600 - 699 lbs -- 0.31% or 3.1 PI's per 1,000 head

This data is important as it shows that although the prevalence rate seems like a small number you don't need to worry about, it can cause detrimental effects to your operation. It will also show how many PI's you should be finding. If you find a significantly less amount of these numbers, we would recommend checking your testing protocols, specifically whether you are pooling samples or not.

The majority of cattle tested were sourced from sale barns in the southern, southeastern and eastern United States.

R.H. Tompkins Livestock

Welcome to R.H. Tompkins Livestock

R.H. Tompkins Livestock offers the CST-QuickTest BVD PI test.

BVD PI Testing

Have Your Cattle Tested Before They Get On The Truck

Here is a test plate showing a positive BVD PI animal.

Incidence and Prevalence Rate for BVD-PI in Feeder Operations

Cattle ready to have ears notched for the BVD PI test