The recent outbreak of COVID-19 is all over the news and certainly has impacted our daily lives.

In the U.S. we’re getting a real taste of what some countries deal with on a frequent basis. While this virus affects the human population, this is a good time to turn our focus back to biosecurity in the farming community.

A few years ago, several foreign countries dealt with mad cow, foot and mouth and the swine flu; closer to home we’re dealing with chronic wasting disease, CWD, in our whitetail herd.

Typically, when one animal on the farm gets this disease, herds have to be eradicated to stop the spread. This is not only tragic but a huge financial burden to the farmers affected.

To combat this, the U.S. Department of Agriculture recommends every farm adopt biosecurity measures to not only protect the farm but slow the spread in case an outbreak occurs.

Typical biosecurity measures include limiting or prohibiting guests from entering animal housing areas; quarantining new animals to the farm for monitoring purposes and not mixing feed and manure handling equipment across livestock types.

For those agents that visit the farm, whether they are a government agent like Penn State, USDA or the conservation district or your local vet, that person should be disinfecting their footwear with bleach upon entering and exiting the farm to eliminate any possible contamination or transport and the vehicles should be parked away from any animal areas so mud or other debris is minimized.

While these are good steps, a farmer may want to adopt further measures, especially at dairy operations where milk and feed trucks are moving from dairy to dairy, which is the easiest and quickest way an outbreak can occur.

Disinfecting tire baths are the easiest way to handle this type of traffic and are set up by either the farmer or the driver and are located away from the buildings to help clean the truck before entering the animal area and again the driver should be scrubbing down immediately upon exiting and entering the truck.

While this article covers a lot of the high-level items to keep your farm safe, the best defense is you the farmer being vigilant with your own work and closely monitoring farm guests.

Don’t be afraid to speak up if someone shows up to the farm in a muddy truck or has muddy or dusty floor mats. You’re not sure where that dirt came from and what it contains. Additionally, have signs posted prohibiting entry to animal areas or any part of the farm you don’t want people wandering through.

Following these few steps will help keep everyone safe out there.

Andy Gaver is a conservationist with the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service in Butler County.