Originally from: Bill
                        
Sorry, Paul, I stand corrected. Foot rot is not always difficult to distinguish from FMD but sometimes it can be.

I had seen FMD in 1967/68 and in July 2000 was out walking near Lancaster and saw what I very much suspected was FMD in some sheep in a field. OK, I was walking on the road, but I was concerned enough to stop and stare into the field for a good 10 to 15 minutes. Eventually I walked on but for a couple of days thought about reporting what I had seen. But you don't do you? If I'd been wrong I wouldn't have been able to show my face in the area again.

It didn't even register when the first case cropped up at Heddon-on-the-Wall but three or so months later there was a hot-spot just further up the road from where I had seen those animals the previous July. I'll never know whether or not I was right, perhaps just as well!

All the best,
Bill.