Visitor Biosecurity Issues
Whether coming to see a “real farm” in action or to conduct business on
your farm, visitors come with the potential to introduce new diseases or
spread existing infections to more animals. Different types of visitors pose
different levels of risk. For some visitors, the diseases present on a farm
may pose a risk to their own health.
Visiting school children generally pose the lowest level of risk to your
operation. On the other hand, visitors who do not live or work on farms may
encounter additional risks to their own health while visiting. Milk truck
drivers, sales and service personnel can be considered medium risk visitors
because they travel between multiple farms, but rarely come in close contact
with livestock or their manure. High-risk visitors include veterinarians and
artificial inseminators, foot trimmers, fleece shearers, livestock dealers or
haulers and deadstock haulers. These visitors are classified as high-risk
because they work directly with livestock on more than one farm. Different
types of visitors, therefore, require different restrictions on access and
requirements for hygiene while on your farm.
Not only do different types of visitors pose different levels of risk, but also
different areas of the farm or types of animals are more susceptible to the
introduction of or potential transmission of infectious diseases. Most dairy
farms do not go as far as prohibiting visitors or making them shower in and
shower out, but all farms do need to evaluate the risks posed by various
types of visitors and develop strategies to minimize threats to the health of
their livestock.
Traffic patterns for visitors in vehicles and on foot must be considered when
developing a biosecurity plan. General guidelines are provided in this
section. Understanding which areas of the farm are at highest risk for
disease introduction or transfer as well as being able to identify the level of
risk posed by various people coming onto the farm will help you develop an
effective plan.
The most critical component of all is vigilance in enforcing the plan.
Protecting the health of your animals should be a priority for you and your
employees. The ultimate responsibility for communicating and carrying out
the biosecurity plan on a farm rests on the owner’s shoulders.
General Guidelines for All Visitors
If your farm regularly hosts visitors, you should do the following:

Have a single, clearly marked entrance for all visitors to control the
flow of traffic.
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Refuse entry to visitors who have returned less than a week ago from
areas of the world where Foot and Mouth Disease exists. Consider
refusing entry to all visitors who have traveled outside of North
America in the past five to seven days. (See Foreign Animal Disease
Prevention on page 45.)

Keep a visitor log to record who was on the farm and when.

Maintain accessible, functioning hand and boot wash stations.

Supply disposable plastic boots for visitors who need them, and
provide a means for their disposal on the farm.

Know the risk posed by your visitors (low, medium, or high) and
prepare accordingly.

Clearly mark and restrict access to all high-risk areas. (See page 41 in
this section for a description of high-risk areas that should be offlimits to most visitors).
Low- and Medium-Risk Visitors
Characteristics of low-risk visitors
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Do not make regular farm visits or work on a farm
Do not own their own livestock
Do not have close contact with your livestock while visiting
Examples of low-risk visitors include people from public tour groups,
children on school field trips, etc.
To ensure biosecurity with low-risk visitors, follow these steps:

Contact them ahead of time (if possible) and request they wear clean
boots and outerwear.

Provide disposable boot covers.

Limit their contact with livestock.

Make sure they note which areas are marked off-limits and avoid
them.

Encourage them to wash their hands before eating and before leaving
the farm.
Characteristics of medium-risk visitors
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Make regular farm visits
Do not have close contact with your livestock
May or may not own livestock
Examples of medium-risk visitors include feed salespersons,
mechanics, fuel delivery personnel, etc.
To ensure biosecurity with medium-risk visitors,

Make sure they sanitize their boots upon entry.

Provide disposable boot covers if footwear cannot be easily sanitized.

Limit their contact with livestock.

Make sure they do not enter areas marked off-limits.

Make sure they do not track manure into feed bunks.

Prevent visitor vehicles from driving across feed delivery lanes. If at
all possible, vehicles also should not drive over manure or manure
hauling routes.
High-Risk Visitors
Characteristics of high-risk visitors
 Make regular farm visits
 Have routine close contact with your livestock and that of others
 May or may not own their own livestock
 Examples of high-risk visitors include cattle dealers and haulers,
veterinarians, inseminators, hoof trimmers, etc.
* Visitors who recently returned from traveling outside of the US may
also be high risk and should be screened out at the entry point to the
farm. (See Foreign Animal Disease Prevention on page 45.)
To ensure biosecurity with high-risk visitors, follow these
steps:

Make sure they are wearing clean footwear and clothing onto your
farm and that they sanitize their boots upon arrival. Consider keeping
a set of boots and coveralls on your farm for use by high-risk
individuals.

Provide equipment from your own farm or require clean and sanitized
equipment to be used. Provide your own halters and ropes.

Organize work from clean to dirty (e.g., visit feed storage before
animals), young to old, healthy to sick.

Make certain that those in contact with livestock, manure, or other
bodily fluids are wearing disposable gloves, coveralls, etc.

Don’t assume that high-risk visitors will automatically follow
biosecurity protocols. You are responsible for enforcing biosecurity
and other protocols on your own farm. A plan that is clearly
communicated and consistently enforced will be respected.
Identifying High-Risk Areas of Your Farm
Not only do different types of visitors pose different levels of risk, but so do
different areas of the farm or groups of animals. The areas housing animals
that are more susceptible to the introduction or potential transmission of
infectious diseases are high risk areas. The animals that are most susceptible
to disease are young calves, especially prior to and just after weaning, cows
in the few weeks before to few weeks after calving, and animals that are
already sick. These categories of animals are also most likely to shed
microbial organisms (such as bacteria, viruses, or protozoa) that can infect
other livestock. Some of these pathogens can cause illness in humans as
well.
The areas with the highest risk in terms of biosecurity are those where
animals meet either of the following conditions:

more susceptible to disease, having an undeveloped or
suppressed immune system, or

most likely to be shedding disease-causing organisms that can
be transmitted to other animals or to people.
High-risk areas on farms include the following:

Birthing/calving pen
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Sick pen
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Close-up pen
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Fresh pen
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Housing for young stock less than 6 months of age.
Signage around the Farm
Signs can help you get your message across to visitors and farm employees
alike. Not only the lack of, but poor wording or location of signs may
undermine your efforts to improve biosecurity. Signs that are professionally
made, or look as if they were, will convey your commitment to biosecurity
and will be more effective than, say, a piece of paper stapled to a door or
post.
Where signs are located is also very important. Signs should be placed
where visitors cannot help but notice. Signs mounted off to the side of a
door or among a number of other signs are likely to be missed or ignored.
Two simple ways to place signs effectively are to hang them from a barrier
chain or mount them on a post placed in the visitor’s path of travel. Chains
made of yellow plastic links and posts made of scrap angle iron and set into
a bucket of cement are effective, cheap, and easy to move out of the way
when necessary.
Professionally made signs need not cost a lot of money either. For example,
a 12” X 18” sign, with vinyl lettering printed on metal or plastic, can be
made for about $30 to $50 per sign in the Burlington area. Larger signs,
similar to metal 24” X 36 “ handicap parking signs often found in parking
lots, may cost about $100 to make. In addition, many nutrition companies
now offer, free of charge, some form of restricted entry sign bearing their
logo.
The message on the sign can also vary in tone to reflect whether you want to
welcome and/or warn your visitors.
Perimeter and Main Entrance Signs:
A NOTICE FOR VISITORS
We are proud to uphold high standards
of health and safety on our farm.
Please take note of all visitor guidelines
to help maintain a healthy and safe
environment for our animals,
and for you, our visitors.
DO NOT ENTER!
AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
To ensure the biosecurity of our animals,
all visitors with permission must properly
sanitize footwear before entering
these facilities and again before leaving.
Foreign Animal Disease Prevention
Standard signage at entrance
<<OUR FARM>> is taking precautions to prevent agricultural diseases from
spreading to this country.
IF YOU OR ANYONE WITH YOU TODAY HAS BEEN OUTSIDE OF
THE UNITED STATES WITHIN THE PAST 5 (FIVE) DAYS PLEASE
DO NOT ENTER <<insert name of farm>> WITHOUT ASKING OUR
STAFF FOR MORE INFORMATION. THANK YOU!!
Response from staff
Anyone who has been outside of the United States or Canada within 5 (five)
days of visiting our farm may be asked not to visit or to limit their access to
certain areas until a five-day period has passed and disinfection instructions
have been followed. If you have traveled through agricultural areas,
livestock pastures, or farms in a foreign country where a highly contagious
infectious disease of livestock is currently present, we request that you do
not visit our farm today. Please come back when five days or more have
passed since your last visit abroad. If you did not visit any agricultural area,
we request that you limit your visit today to <<THE WALKING TRAILS
OR OFFICE OR VISITOR CENTER AS APPROPRIATE TO YOUR
FARM>> and do not enter any pastures or barns. If you have traveled in a
country where there is not an outbreak of a disease currently foreign to the
United States or did not visit any agricultural areas, please wear plastic
booties (provided at the entrance to the main barn) and do not touch the
animals or their feed.
Disinfection instructions for travelers
The United States Department of Agriculture Veterinary Services maintains
lists of the recognized health status of countries either affected by or free of
certain diseases that do not exist in this country. These lists can be accessed
at http://www.aphis.usda.gov/vs/ncie/country.html. If you have visited a
country that presently has confirmed cases of highly contagious infectious
animal diseases, you should follow these instructions before visiting any
livestock farms, fairs, or shows. Launder or dry clean all clothing and
outerwear worn abroad. Remove all dirt and soil from shoes by thorough
cleaning, then wipe them with a cloth or sponge dampened with a bleach
solution. For the bleach solution, dilute 5 (five) teaspoons of household
bleach in 1 (one) gallon of water. Also wipe luggage and all personal items
(such as watches, cameras, laptop computers, CD players, and cell phones)
with the bleach solution.