Details of 12 cattle found to have BSE this month were given yesterday by the Department of Agriculture and Food.
Last January 11 cases were recorded, but this month's figures include details of a cohort animal that was found in follow-up research on cows in a herd in which the BSE was identified last year.
Yesterday's figures show that Ireland has had 268 cases of mad cow disease since it was identified here in 1989, following its identification in Britain four years before.
A veterinary expert said last night that the figures seem to indicate that the Department of Agriculture is coming to grips with the problem.
"I would have expected this number of cases in January because traditionally it has been a bad month for BSE, perhaps because of the stress of calving," he said.
The cases were in a six-year-old dairy cow in Cork, in two herds in Cavan involving a five- and a six-year-old animal and in two dairy herds in Kilkenny where the cows were four years old.
There were two six-year-old cows found with the disease in dairy herds in Galway and Tipperary, a seven-year-old cow in Meath and in a six-year-old dairy cow in Limerick.
The details of three cases, including the cohort animal, were withheld because the farmers have not yet been formally notified about the results.
The locations of the farms where the disease has been found are carefully monitored by Irish farmers who have already seen a Russian ban imposed on some Irish counties where BSE animals have been detected.
The number of cattle on farms where BSE-infected animals have been found totals 1,177 and these will be slaughtered in line with Government policy.
Since 1990 Ireland has slaughtered all the cattle on farms where the disease has been found. This policy has cost the Irish taxpayer over £20 million but has reassured Irish and overseas buyers of Irish beef.