Eleven seronegative calves were intravenously inoculated with bluetongue virus (BTV) serotype 10, and two calves were inoculated with a placebo. Cellular association of BTV during viremia was investigated in three of the calves by titrating virus present in plasma and different blood cell fractions at weekly intervals after infection. Viremia persisted 35 to 49 days in individual calves. Virus was transiently isolated from blood mononuclear cells and plasma collected from two of the calves but was consistently isolated from erythrocytes throughout infection of all three animals. Titers of BTV present in the erythrocyte fraction were comparable to those of the unseparated blood cell fraction. Tissue tropism of BTV was determined by viral isolation from tissues collected from calves euthanatized at 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 14, 28, 42, and 56 (2 calves) days after inoculation with BTV. Tropism was also determined by immunohistochemical staining of selected tissues with an avidin-biotin complex immunoperoxidase staining procedure using three BTV-specific monoclonal antibodies. The BTV infected calves remained healthy throughout the study. Virus was isolated from at least one tissue collected from calves euthanatized at 1 through 28 days after inoculation, but not thereafter. High titers of BTV were present in the lungs, prescapular and mesenteric lymph nodes, thymus, and spleen of calves euthanatized at 1 to 4 days after inoculation, whereas BTV was either not isolated or isolated in low titer from bone marrow collected from these animals.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)