Citizens at the mention of smallpox hardly recall that this terrible human disease, which deserved the ominous name of "black death", had been defeated by mass vaccination by the middle of the last century. But the villagers, especially in areas of traditional sheep and wild goat hunting, are unlikely to think about people - for them, sheep and goat pox and to this day represents a significant danger to their livestock business.
Description and pathogen
A full list of symptoms will be given below, and here we confine ourselves to indicating the feverish acute nature of this disease for sheep (only domestic animals are sick of domestic animals) and wild goats, the main symptom of which is papular-pustular rash on mucous membranes, accompanied by intoxication of the body and high mortality. 
The causative agent of smallpox is characterized by a relatively large Sheep capripoxvirus virus relative to other similar microorganisms.
For those interested in popular virology, we add that its virions are oval or brick-shaped, and individual particles, the so-called Paschen bodies, can be seen (whole arrays, in pairs and alone) by microscopic examination by staining them with silvering.
Check out such breeds of goats as the Boer, Lamanchi goats, Alpine.In sick sheep (goats) they are detected in cells of the affected epithelium and inside pustules and vesicles.
Smallpox virus has a number of features:
- capable of long, 2 years or more, to persist at low temperatures, and when frozen, indefinitely for a long time;
- indoors (shepherd) lasts up to 6 months, lasts three times less in sheep wool, in fresh air (on the pasture) - for 62 days;
- within a quarter of an hour, dies due to thermal exposure if t> +53 ° C.
Epizootology
According to the epizootological information, fine-woolted sheep are the most vulnerable to the disease, and the body of the young has not had time to develop a sufficient level of immunity. But other groups of animals, although less at risk, also get sick.
Did you know? With the fame of smallpox as a human disease for the past 37 centuries, information about this disease among sheep appeared only 1900 years ago, and its infectivity for livestock was proved in 1763. After 140 years, the causative agent was also described.Sources of infection are not confined to sick individuals, although this is certainly the main one.
You will also be interested to learn about such diseases in animals as foot and mouth disease, African swine fever, mastitis.The disease is transmitted to healthy goats and sheep by contact also with carriers of the virus, which they are both during the incubation period and after recovery (dried peel crusts remain dangerous for several months).
From patients, the harmful microbe enters the environment along with lagging smallpox crusts and sheaths of the epithelium, as well as nasal mucus. In the latter case, infection most often occurs through the inhaled air, but it can also occur through the penetration of the virus along with the feed into the mucous membranes of the mouth and the pre-gastric part of the digestive system.Milk is another source of disease disease, in case smallpox has affected the udder.
You will be interested to learn more about how to feed a goat.The carriers of infection are objects and substances that have been contaminated by natural excreta, containing pox viruses, as well as other animals (not necessarily sheep and goats) and people who come into contact with sick and virus carriers.
Epizootic - the main form of the spread of smallpox in the flock (herd). Within a fortnight-month, most of the group falls ill. To prevent this from happening and to avoid an increase in mortality, which usually ranges from 2 to 5% of the number of cases, timely measures are necessary. 
By the decision of the International Epizootic Bureau (OIE), smallpox of sheep and goats is included in the group of animal diseases that are rapidly spreading (group A).
Did you know? The Germans made a profitable venture in Bonn - they rent live sheep as lawn mowers. It is cheaper than buying equipment, and sheep, thanks to the special structure of the constitution, are able to bow their heads low and pluck even the smallest blades of grass.
Pathogenesis
Smallpox viruses that have entered the animal organism initially (after about four days) appear in the blood and parenchymal organs (liver, spleen, etc.).
Then 2-3 days of secondary viraemia (getting them through the bloodstream to the cells of the mucous membranes and epithelium).
Important! Painful rash, according to veterinarians, is a defensive reaction of the body, seeking to adapt to the new situation - through the localization of the pathogen as the pathological process develops.It is there that the rapid reproduction of viruses begins, provoking sharp painful manifestations - inflammation, rapidly developing from a serous to a purulent state. Outwardly, this manifests itself in the form of exanthema - the formation of multiple papules and vesicles.
The development of smallpox pathology goes through several stages:
- Prodromal - depressed state is replaced by febrile on the basis of lesions of the mucous membranes.
- Roseola (red spots) appear - two days.
- Roseola is transformed into round, conical shape, papules (knots), girdled with a red line - up to three days.
- There is a transformation of papules into vesicles (bubbles with yellowish serous fluid) for five to six days: at this stage, the general condition of the body gradually becomes better as the temperature decreases.
- Three-day purulent stage - the vesicles are pustularized, pus is formed in the pustules due to the combination of leukocyte accumulations with pyogenic microorganisms.
- Pustules dry up, they are replaced by brown scabs: under the scabs that last a little less than a week, a new epithelium forms - the formation of scarring from connective tissue is possible if there was a significant depth of the lesion.
Inside the body, pathological changes are expressed in that:
- mucous surfaces of the respiratory tract and the gastrointestinal tract are inflamed;
- the throat and the trachea that continues it erode and even ulcerate;
- local hemorrhages may occur on the inner integument, and in the lungs - foci of hepatitis and gangrene;
- spleen volume increases, lymph nodes increase;
- the liver takes on a clay color;
- myocardium becomes flabby.
Symptoms and course of smallpox in sheep and goats
The time frame of the incubation period is quite extensive, its duration varies from 3 days to 2 weeks.
Symptoms develop as follows:
- The eyelids swell, serous discharges appear from the eyes and nasal sinus, changing the content from mucous to purulent;
- the animal sniffles and breathes with difficulty;
- the pinkish rash quickly spreads from the head, lips and eye circles, moving towards the internal parts of the limbs (both front and rear), arising, respectively, in females and males on the udder and labia, scrotum and foreskin;
- Two days later, the papules fringed with red belts are rapidly growing, while the temperature of the body begins to fall;
- after another day or three, the skin in the locations of the papules becomes swollen and has a dark red tint, and the papules themselves, in most cases differing in size, become paler as they develop, changing the red belt to pink, and at the same time acquiring gray color with white or yellow tint;
- further follow the stages of vesicization and pustulization, which, with a copious number of papules, can immediately change to the formation of scabs. They, as already indicated, will disappear in a few days, leaving non-invasive connective scars in their place.
External manifestations of sheep pox are very bright, they are difficult not to notice, but in order to identify the disease, it is advisable to imagine them in advance at least by the available photos.There is also a light, so-called abortive form of the disease, when a few small pockmarks pass very quickly and without a trace, without being transformed in the usual manner, and the sheep are only slightly and briefly depressed, and they are slightly reeling.
Important! Particular attention to diseased lambs - as a result of a drain (extremely severe) form of smallpox, the number of dead young individuals can reach 4/5 of the population.
Treatment
It does not sound regrettable, but there is no effective specific means for curing sick animals with smallpox - scientific veterinary science has not been able to develop them.
In this regard, for sick individuals, some general conditions of treatment are provided based on recovery with the help of drugs that only weaken the effectiveness of the symptoms, as well as antibiotics that help prevent complications. So, the sheep:
- contain separately in the rooms protected from adverse weather manifestations;
- well fed, preferring to give semi-liquid food.
In cases of seriously ill animals, the owners are forced to resort to slaughter.On a wider scale, the entire farm may be quarantined with the decision of the regional authorities with the establishment of veterinary posts with the participation of the police, provided with the necessary equipment and disinfection means.
It will be interesting for you to get acquainted with such breeds of sheep as merino, Romanov sheep, edilbayevsky, fine-fleeced.
Prevention
Quarantine is also a preventive measure against the spread of smallpox to other farms.
Ordinary preventive measures begin with the use of a vaccine against sheep pox to the entire population available (in specialized farms and throughout the territory, including areas directly bordering the danger zone). Flocks are vaccinated in those farms and settlements where earlier, not less than 3 years ago, the incidence of smallpox was recorded and eliminated. 
The content of other preventive measures is fixed in the requirements for those who keep sheep flocks. They must:
- Prevent sheep, implements and fodder from localities and farms where smallpox was discovered on its territory.
- For arriving sheep replenishment apply a monthly quarantine.
- Strictly comply with the statutory standards of sanitary conditions of pens, hauls, pastures and watering places, to which, like the flocks themselves, the responsible employees must be assigned.
- To achieve regular systematic veterinary control of the state of the sheep.
