Influence of Dietary Chlortetracycline on Incidence of Urinary Calculi in Sheep.

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Abstract
Wether feeder lambs (276) were divided into 7 lots for a 98-day period. The animals were self-fed total mixed ground milo-molasses-alfalfa-cottonseed hull diets calculated to contain the same total digestible nutrients with urea or cottonseed meal as a supplementary nitrogen. Twenty-six deaths from urinary calculi occurred. Death losses due to urinary calculi were reduced significantly (p 0.01) among lambs receiving diets containing 10 mg chlortetracycline/lb of feed. Observations of calculi in the kidney of 146 of the remaining lambs at slaughter revealed a lower incidence and less calculi in those lambs having received chlortetracycline in the diet. Calculi formation was exceptionally high in control lambs on pelleted diets. The possibility of a physiological effect of dietary chlortetracycline on the reduction of renal calculi formation and subsequent death from urinary calculi is suggested.

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