A temporary control zone was set up around a premises near Solihull today as officials investigate another suspected case of foot and mouth.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said the control zone was a "precautionary measure" and the disease had not been confirmed on the site, which is just to the south of Birmingham International Airport.

Animal health officials have carried out an assessment of the animals' clinical symptoms and lab tests are under way, Defra said.

The temporary control zone was set up just hours after chief vet Debby Reynolds urged farmers to undertake twice daily inspections of their cattle in a bid to eradicate foot and mouth.

Dr Reynolds said more than 100 reports of possible cases had been examined and negated and some 1,700 animals have been slaughtered since the initial outbreak in August infected two farms near the village of Normandy, in Surrey.

Three new cases near Egham, Surrey, have emerged in the last two weeks - just days after officials declared the UK free of the disease following the August outbreak.

A number of sites outside the county have also been investigated and several temporary control zones have been set up in recent weeks, including in Kent and Norfolk.

But all have proved to be false alarms, with no cases of foot and mouth detected outside of Surrey since the outbreak emerged at the beginning of August.

The original outbreak has been blamed on the virus escaping from leaking pipes at the nearby Pirbright laboratory site.

Earlier today, it was revealed that tests on animals slaughtered in the two most recent cases of foot and mouth indicate they were infected at the time the UK was declared clear of the disease by officials on September 7.

Chief vet Debby Reynolds said cattle on the fifth infected premises - Klondyke Farm, near Egham, Surrey - had foot and mouth lesions that were more than 10 days old after the animals were slaughtered on Monday.

And animals on Stroude Farm, where livestock were culled last week, had lesions that were up to 10 days old.

Dr Reynolds said a full epidemiological report would be published by the end of the week and would examine how the animals on the latest farms to be hit had contracted the disease.

And she defended the decision to give the UK the all-clear, saying officials had worked in line with contingency plans and the facts they had at the time.

Four officers from West Midlands police stood guard at the entrance to a half-mile-long track leading from Catherine-de-Barnes Lane to Woodhouse Farm.

Reporters were prevented from passing the officers, who were allowing parents passed them to collect children from dance classes being held at premises which share the access road with the farm.

The farm itself was not visible from the road and no one from Defra was present at the barrier.