Pulpy Kidney

• Pulpy kidney disease]] in well-fed 3-10 week-old lambs
• Caused by Clostridium perfringens type D
• Follows overeating high grain diet or luchious pasture
• Starch from partially digested food enterering the intestine from the rumen allows rapid clostridial proliferation
• Epsilon toxin activated by proteolytic enzymes causes toxaemia
• Epsilon toxin increases intestinal and capillary permeability; also alpha toxin
• Lambs found dead or with opisthotonos, convulsions, coma in acute phases
• Blindness and head pressing in subacute disease; bloat in later stages
• Hyperglycaemia, glycosuria
• Post mortem: hyperaemia in intestine; fluid in pericardial sac; kidney autolysis with pulpy cortical softening (acute death)
• Subacute death causes symmetrical encephalomalacia and haemorrhage in basal ganglia and midbrain
• Enterotoxaemia in kids and adult goats