Influence of putrefactive decay of the hoof horn in sheep on its biochemical and biomechanical properties and hemodynamics in sick animals

Abstract

Sheep breeding is currently an intensively developing branch of animal husbandry. However, one of the limiting factors of its further economically viable development is the mass distribution in the conditions of large sheep-breeding farms with a non-walking technology for keeping purulent-necrotic and putrefactive lesions in the tissues of the distal part of the limbs. The etiology and pathogenesis of these pathologies is currently not fully scientifically substantiated and detailed. In this regard, we assessed the effect of putrefactive decay of the hoof horn in sheep on its biochemical and biomechanical properties, as well as on hemodynamics in diseased animals in comparison with clinically healthy ones. According to the results of the studies, it was determined that during the putrefactive decay of the hoof horn, the percentage of moisture was higher by 12.37%, and the inorganic residue (ash), fat, protein and sulfur was lower by 73.84%, 36.84%, 5.92 % and 3.82% than in its normal morpho-functional state, respectively. This, in turn, had an impact on the biomechanical properties of the hoof horn, namely, during its putrefactive decay, a decrease in compressive elasticity by 3.82%, tensile strength by 28.76%, resistance to repeated bending by 9.61% was recorded relative to similar biomechanical indicators in samples of the hoof horn obtained from clinically healthy sheep. At the same time, in the hemodynamics of diseased animals with putrefactive decay of the hoof cover, in a comparative aspect with similar hematological indicators in clinically healthy sheep, a decrease in the number of erythrocytes and platelets by 28.94% and 7.03%, a decrease in hemoglobin concentration and hematocrit value by 22.88 % and 8.80%, an increase in the number of leukocytes and erythrocyte sedimentation rate by 89.14% and 44.70%, respectively.