Flystrike is one of the most painful and preventable conditions affecting sheep. Understanding its causes and prevention is essential for anyone responsible for sheep welfare.
Flystrike causes some of the most severe and prolonged suffering experienced by farmed animals. The larvae consume living tissue actively; affected sheep experience intense pain, distress, and systemic illness as the strike progresses. Animals in early strike may not be obviously distressed from a distance, making regular, close inspection critical for early detection. Prevention is far preferable to treatment; effective preventive strategies including insecticide application to high-risk areas, breeding for dag resistance and low wool wrinkle, and pasture management to reduce contaminated areas all reduce incidence substantially. The welfare cost of flystrike is entirely preventable with appropriate management commitment, making it a marker of farm welfare standards as well as an acute welfare emergency in individual cases.