Mulesing essay
Bonnie Stewart 11486711
Molly Vardanega 11486712
Introduction
To control flystrike we would perform mulesing in a safe and sanitary environment using suitable pain relief and if needed, veterinary guidance.
Mulesing, developed in 1927 by John Mules, is a routine husbandry procedure performed, mostly on merino sheep in Australia, during the cooler months of the year to avoid attracting more flies (Mulesing of Sheep, n.d.). It involves cutting a slice of skin from each side of the buttocks area (the usual cut is about 5-7 cm in width each side) and extends slightly less than half way from the anus to the hock of the back leg in length. Skin can sometimes be stripped from the sides and the end of the tail stub. The procedure is ‘usually’ done without any anesthetic however, with recent laws and regulations being enforced, mulesing is slowly being phased out.
Mulesing does reduce the incidence of fly strike around the buttocks because as the skin scars and tightens from the cut the flies have nowhere to lay eggs. Mulesing only affects the buttocks region on the sheep and does not prevent fly strike on other parts of the body (Animals Australia, n.d.).
Because the scared skin has no folds or wrinkles to hold moisture and feces it makes the sheep less susceptible to fly strike. If sheep are left un-mulesed maggots develop in the wrinkles and eat the flesh of the sheep (New Merino, n.d.).
Lambs are known to be in pain up to 3 days following mulesing and over 20 million merino lambs are currently mulesed each year. It is estimated also that 3 million sheep die per year due to fly strike (Animals Australia, n.d.).
Mulesing causes pain obviously but so does a sheep dying from fly strike so the argument is that mulesing is...
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