5-Month Old Goose Lethargic, Not Eating, and Now Limping

[Goosebaby]

It’s probably zinc toxicity if she swallowed wire, it can cause neurological problems, slow digestion and lack of apetite, and organ issues. The wire will need to be removed if she’s going to have a chance at survival and she might need CaEDTA injections. If it’s zinc it leaves the body much more easily and quickly than lead which is a good thing, and less expensive, but it won’t come cheap unfortunatly anyway. I’m sorry you’ve gone through all this.

I have a vet like that here in California, VCA in Chico. I scheduled an appointment specifically with their exotics vet “Dr. B” for 4pm to examin my sick gander, asked how much expierience he had with geese, ducks, waterfowl, and how many he’d seen. Gave all my ganders information, feather color, weight, age, all his symptoms and everything.
I got there after a long drive and was told that they thought I was bringing in a dog, they allegedly thought that “Parsnip, gander, a male goose, breed: French Toulouse, he has grey feathers” was all the name of my dog?!
Then they told me that Dr. B who I scheduled an appointment with, wouldn’t be in till 8pm but I would have to pay an additional emergency hours fee “$250” to see him at 8pm. It was all a big scam and I found out on their yelp reviews they behave like this all the time.
Not all vets are good people sadly.

 

[The Dim Side]

It’s probably zinc toxicity if she swallowed wire, it can cause neurological problems, slow digestion and lack of apetite, and organ issues. The wire will need to be removed if she’s going to have a chance at survival and she might need CaEDTA injections. If it’s zinc it leaves the body much more easily and quickly than lead which is a good thing, and less expensive, but it won’t come cheap unfortunatly anyway. I’m sorry you’ve gone through all this.

I have a vet like that here in California, VCA in Chico. I scheduled an appointment specifically with their exotics vet “Dr. B” for 4pm to examin my sick gander, asked how much expierience he had with geese, ducks, waterfowl, and how many he’d seen. Gave all my ganders information, feather color, weight, age, all his symptoms and everything.
I got there after a long drive and was told that they thought I was bringing in a dog, they allegedly thought that “Parsnip, gander, a male goose, breed: French Toulouse, he has grey feathers” was all the name of my dog?!
Then they told me that Dr. B who I scheduled an appointment with, wouldn’t be in till 8pm but I would have to pay an additional emergency hours fee “$250” to see him at 8pm. It was all a big scam and I found out on their yelp reviews they behave like this all the time.
Not all vets are good people sadly.

The vet said something about medication to dissolve the metal inside. I don't know how soon they're going to start her on it though, I hope they did today. She said the lab results for the other things would take a couple days, and I just hate that it'll be even more time with whatever's wrong inside her. I'm really upset that I didn't just do the X-ray on Tuesday, that would have been 5 less days of it inside her like that, but it was a struggle with the BF to do those tests with X-rays being the most expensive. (But we ended up spending way more anyway, lol.) So I'm just worried we waited too long.

And since they're officially closed on Sundays, I only got the updates this morning, and no one is around to answer the phone for any more information. I don't even know for sure if someone's watching her while they're closed. I called and asked the Metro place since they're kind of connected, and they said there's a technician with them at all times, just not a receptionist. But judging by their inaccurate information yesterday, I'm taking it with a grain of salt and just keep worrying. And my poor other goose is alone in the meantime.

I'm sorry to hear about your troubles, too! Was this the same gander that was ill in March with the albendazole dosage? I happened to come across it when searching about this issue. How are your geese doing?

I think the vets themselves may be okay at that place (albeit not trained in exotics specifically). But it was the front desk and technicians that were terrible. They weren't letting people inside, so the waiting room was just the parking lot, and a couple came rushing in because their dog had been seizing. They checked the dog's vitals with everything okay, and they gave the dog back and asked them to wait in the car to be checked in officially. Then the dog literally started seizing right outside the front doors, and it took a couple minutes for the owners to get the technicians/attendants to come back outside to take the dog, while we could see like 4 of them just standing inside at the desk behind the glass walls. It was horrific to see how slow they were to respond. And they had my goose in there for 6 hours when they ultimately didn't even do that much with her. The whole thing is stressful, and I feel so bad for Lemongrab (the goose) and hate not being able to be with her.

 

[Goosebaby]

The vet said something about medication to dissolve the metal inside. I don't know how soon they're going to start her on it though, I hope they did today. She said the lab results for the other things would take a couple days, and I just hate that it'll be even more time with whatever's wrong inside her. I'm really upset that I didn't just do the X-ray on Tuesday, that would have been 5 less days of it inside her like that, but it was a struggle with the BF to do those tests with X-rays being the most expensive. (But we ended up spending way more anyway, lol.) So I'm just worried we waited too long.

And since they're officially closed on Sundays, I only got the updates this morning, and no one is around to answer the phone for any more information. I don't even know for sure if someone's watching her while they're closed. I called and asked the Metro place since they're kind of connected, and they said there's a technician with them at all times, just not a receptionist. But judging by their inaccurate information yesterday, I'm taking it with a grain of salt and just keep worrying. And my poor other goose is alone in the meantime.

I'm sorry to hear about your troubles, too! Was this the same gander that was ill in March with the albendazole dosage? I happened to come across it when searching about this issue. How are your geese doing?

I think the vets themselves may be okay at that place (albeit not trained in exotics specifically). But it was the front desk and technicians that were terrible. They weren't letting people inside, so the waiting room was just the parking lot, and a couple came rushing in because their dog had been seizing. They checked the dog's vitals with everything okay, and they gave the dog back and asked them to wait in the car to be checked in officially. Then the dog literally started seizing right outside the front doors, and it took a couple minutes for the owners to get the technicians/attendants to come back outside to take the dog, while we could see like 4 of them just standing inside at the desk behind the glass walls. It was horrific to see how slow they were to respond. And they had my goose in there for 6 hours when they ultimately didn't even do that much with her. The whole thing is stressful, and I feel so bad for Lemongrab (the goose) and hate not being able to be with her.

That’s the truth, it’s cheaper spending what you can initially and getting to the root of the problem, it costs more in the long run treating symptomatically when you don’t know what’s wrong, I found that oUt the hard way this year. Is it possible for you to check on your goose? The behavior of the staff there sounds concerning!

The gander I took to VCA was Parsnip a few years ago, I actually just left after they did that, I wasn’t going to wait 4 hours to get charged more for an appointment the vet decided to not show up to and have his receptionists lie about it. Who knows what other bs they would have pulled. I found out later they have a habit of spontaneously euthanizing pets without approval so I think we dodged a bullet there. I ended up taking Parsnip to a different vet three hours away but who is much more professional. It turned out Parsnip has a pancreatic issue.

The gander having issues this year is his son Roxby, though now it’s the whole flock, whatever the issue is now it’s contageous, I just had more tests done yesterday and I’m hoping they finally tell me what’s been going on.

 

[The Dim Side]

Unfortunately, I can't check in on her at all. I've tried calling all the numbers I could find on the website, but no one answered. I just have to worry until 9 a.m. tomorrow when they open, I guess. BF just wanted to avoid the idea of taking in farm animals to the vet if possible (and do more home healthcare) because the more we get, the less affordable it would become. But the geese are pretty much just our pets (they were terrible as guard geese for the chickens, lol), and I have a habit of getting attached to every animal, so it was really BF's fault for not expecting this to happen!

And oh my gosh!!! They euthanized them without approval!? I can't believe they could get away with something like that. For the Metro place we went, I saw afterward that they have pretty bad reviews on Yelp. But I didn't think to look them up because I was just desperately trying to find a place that would take a goose on a Saturday.

I'm sorry about Parsnip, Roxby, and the rest of your flock! That's so scary to have to deal with. I hope they're able to find the cause of it quickly. But does that mean they're limping like Roxby is? Just wondering since Lemongrab started limping, too. And they don't know what's causing that either.

I've read geese can live up to 20-25 years depending on the breed. But it seems like health issues can be devastating as well. I initially heard they were more hardy animals, but I guess that's true compared to chickens at least.

 

[Goosebaby]

Unfortunately, I can't check in on her at all. I've tried calling all the numbers I could find on the website, but no one answered. I just have to worry until 9 a.m. tomorrow when they open, I guess. BF just wanted to avoid the idea of taking in farm animals to the vet if possible (and do more home healthcare) because the more we get, the less affordable it would become. But the geese are pretty much just our pets (they were terrible as guard geese for the chickens, lol), and I have a habit of getting attached to every animal, so it was really BF's fault for not expecting this to happen!

And oh my gosh!!! They euthanized them without approval!? I can't believe they could get away with something like that. For the Metro place we went, I saw afterward that they have pretty bad reviews on Yelp. But I didn't think to look them up because I was just desperately trying to find a place that would take a goose on a Saturday.

I'm sorry about Parsnip, Roxby, and the rest of your flock! That's so scary to have to deal with. I hope they're able to find the cause of it quickly. But does that mean they're limping like Roxby is? Just wondering since Lemongrab started limping, too. And they don't know what's causing that either.

I've read geese can live up to 20-25 years depending on the breed. But it seems like health issues can be devastating as well. I initially heard they were more hardy animals, but I guess that's true compared to chickens at least.

How is Lemongrab?



I don’t actually know how VCA is legally still running as a business at this point. It’s one of life’s big mysteries.

I’ve noticed a few of my birds develop a subtle limp, but it will go away and it hasn’t progressed to be as bad as what happened to Roxby. Today Roxby is walking a little wobbly again.
It doesn’t surprise me that they don’t know why your goose is limping, “poultry” medical knowledge lags behind avian medicine which is decades behind companion animal medicine “dogs, cats, horses,” which is itself behind human medicine. And most health articles relating to poultry are tailored to chickens, so vets themselves know very little about waterfowl. The best you can do is to find an avian/exotics vet that’s willing to think and work outside the box, to see that what works for a parrot or chicken might also work for a goose. Some modern vets can’t do that I’ve found. The difference between a chicken and goose might as well be the difference between a goat and a orangutan for them.

Miss Lydia here has a 20 year old pair, I’ve heard of a few others getting that old, but it is hard with illness, this last year has been rough for mine with whatever this sickness is, I strongly suspect they got it from my new neighbor’s chickens, who moved in a few weeks before my geese started getting sick. Biosecurity is important and I’ve always been careful, but it doesn’t mean anything if your neighbors aren’t careful, or if the wrong wild bird or rat wanders into the yard. After this and what I’ve seen in the emergency forums I’m not sure I’ll ever get chickens, I just couldn't deal with the stress of dealing with how many illnesses they’re susceptible to, and I know I’d get attached to them like I do with my geese.

 

[The Dim Side]

How is Lemongrab?



I don’t actually know how VCA is legally still running as a business at this point. It’s one of life’s big mysteries.

I’ve noticed a few of my birds develop a subtle limp, but it will go away and it hasn’t progressed to be as bad as what happened to Roxby. Today Roxby is walking a little wobbly again.
It doesn’t surprise me that they don’t know why your goose is limping, “poultry” medical knowledge lags behind avian medicine which is decades behind companion animal medicine “dogs, cats, horses,” which is itself behind human medicine. And most health articles relating to poultry are tailored to chickens, so vets themselves know very little about waterfowl. The best you can do is to find an avian/exotics vet that’s willing to think and work outside the box, to see that what works for a parrot or chicken might also work for a goose. Some modern vets can’t do that I’ve found. The difference between a chicken and goose might as well be the difference between a goat and a orangutan for them.

Miss Lydia here has a 20 year old pair, I’ve heard of a few others getting that old, but it is hard with illness, this last year has been rough for mine with whatever this sickness is, I strongly suspect they got it from my new neighbor’s chickens, who moved in a few weeks before my geese started getting sick. Biosecurity is important and I’ve always been careful, but it doesn’t mean anything if your neighbors aren’t careful, or if the wrong wild bird or rat wanders into the yard. After this and what I’ve seen in the emergency forums I’m not sure I’ll ever get chickens, I just couldn't deal with the stress of dealing with how many illnesses they’re susceptible to, and I know I’d get attached to them like I do with my geese.

Well, still seems pretty much the same so far. They said she isn't wanting to eat on her own still, but she has good energy.

I did learn that they are giving CaEDTA though, I guess that's with the chelation therapy. I wasn't super clear before how it all worked, lol. So I'm hoping it's dissolving, but they may need to do surgery if not. They're going to do X-rays again tomorrow, and they said she'll need to stay there till at least Saturday. Here are the X-rays though:



It actually looks like there may be more than just that one long piece? I'm gonna ask about it during my evening call with the vet today though. I just can't figure out what that metal would be from either. I also learned that I am allowed to visit (I had thought they didn't allow it), so I'll be making the drive out tomorrow, haha, since I have a work thing in the way today.

And yeah, it's certainly frustrating the lack of medical knowledge they have for waterfowl. I understand why it isn't a priority, though from what I've seen, it seems like having pet geese is more of a thing than I ever thought before we got them, lol. The vet thinks the metal might be pushing out and causing the limp though, just discomfort.

A 20-year-old pair sounds so adorable. But aw, your poor flock! It makes me want to take more precautions with mine now. I'm still confused about de-worming, too. I've seen some people say they pretreat it and others say they treat it only if they notice the geese having it. And then what they use to treat varies. One vet said ivermectin for it, but she wasn't a goose vet, so I'm a little wary, too. Does that sound right? Are there other preventative measures we can take or vaccines?

 

[Goosebaby]

Well, still seems pretty much the same so far. They said she isn't wanting to eat on her own still, but she has good energy.

I did learn that they are giving CaEDTA though, I guess that's with the chelation therapy. I wasn't super clear before how it all worked, lol. So I'm hoping it's dissolving, but they may need to do surgery if not. They're going to do X-rays again tomorrow, and they said she'll need to stay there till at least Saturday. Here are the X-rays though:

View attachment 2792789View attachment 2792790View attachment 2792791

It actually looks like there may be more than just that one long piece? I'm gonna ask about it during my evening call with the vet today though. I just can't figure out what that metal would be from either. I also learned that I am allowed to visit (I had thought they didn't allow it), so I'll be making the drive out tomorrow, haha, since I have a work thing in the way today.

And yeah, it's certainly frustrating the lack of medical knowledge they have for waterfowl. I understand why it isn't a priority, though from what I've seen, it seems like having pet geese is more of a thing than I ever thought before we got them, lol. The vet thinks the metal might be pushing out and causing the limp though, just discomfort.

A 20-year-old pair sounds so adorable. But aw, your poor flock! It makes me want to take more precautions with mine now. I'm still confused about de-worming, too. I've seen some people say they pretreat it and others say they treat it only if they notice the geese having it. And then what they use to treat varies. One vet said ivermectin for it, but she wasn't a goose vet, so I'm a little wary, too. Does that sound right? Are there other preventative measures we can take or vaccines?

The only vaccines I know of are for viruses like infectious bronchitis which geese can get, and one for mycoplasma, though it’s a live vaccine so essentially you’re just giving your goose mycoplasma, albeit a mild version. There are Mereks and Luekosis vaccines but according some sources geese aren’t susceptible to those though.
Ivermectin from what I’ve heard really only works on mites, I remember a few articles here where people used it to treat roundworms and it did nothing, ivermectin makes their bodies intolerable to mites from what I’ve heard but isn’t very infective with worms. A better wormer would be albendazole “which I’ve used with my geese without issues” and fendbendazole which I haven’t tried.
As for wether to pre treat or treat only when there’s an issue I don’t really know, I guess it’s a matter of preference.

 

[Goosebaby]

The only vaccines I know of are for viruses like infectious bronchitis which geese can get, and one for mycoplasma, though it’s a live vaccine so essentially you’re just giving your goose mycoplasma, albeit a mild version. There are Mereks and Luekosis vaccines but according some sources geese aren’t susceptible to those though.
Ivermectin from what I’ve heard really only works on mites, I remember a few articles here where people used it to treat roundworms and it did nothing, ivermectin makes their bodies intolerable to mites from what I’ve heard but isn’t very infective with worms. A better wormer would be albendazole “which I’ve used with my geese without issues” and fendbendazole which I haven’t tried.
As for wether to pre treat or treat only when there’s an issue I don’t really know, I guess it’s a matter of preference.

From what I know CaEDTA is the chelation therapy, I gave it to my gander by injection into the right breast muscle every 12 hours for 5 days until we found out his test results showed he was negative for metals in his blood, we suspected he had swallowed lead and that was why he had no control of his legs, turns out that wasn’t the issue.
It has to be given by injection because if it’s given orally it can hasten the absorption of lead into the bloodstream. I think it’s their own digestive acid that dissolves the metal, unless there’s something else that does that that I don’t know about.

According to this site CaEDTA is better suited to scrubbing out lead than other metals https://advancednaturopathic.com/ne...heavy-metal-toxicity-diagnosis-and-treatment/

“Depending on the chelating agent used, it is either given intravenously, as is the case with calcium EDTA and DMPS, or orally using DMSA. Each chelating agent has a certain affinity for the different toxic metals: EDTA is best to pull out lead and aluminum, DMPS had the highest affinity for mercury, and DMSA is the best broad-spectrum chelator”

So the best chelating agent would depend on what that wire is made from, and without knowing what it’s composition is it’s hard to say which one should be used.

Without removing the wire they still might be able to tell what it’s composition is by testing her blood for metals, whichever is elevated is the culprit.

 

[Goosebaby]

Just a random guess but a lot of wire is made out of aluminum or aluminum/ copper, copper if it’s electrical wire, often it can be galvanized with zinc, so she might have elevated zinc in her system.

 

[The Dim Side]

The only vaccines I know of are for viruses like infectious bronchitis which geese can get, and one for mycoplasma, though it’s a live vaccine so essentially you’re just giving your goose mycoplasma, albeit a mild version. There are Mereks and Luekosis vaccines but according some sources geese aren’t susceptible to those though.
Ivermectin from what I’ve heard really only works on mites, I remember a few articles here where people used it to treat roundworms and it did nothing, ivermectin makes their bodies intolerable to mites from what I’ve heard but isn’t very infective with worms. A better wormer would be albendazole “which I’ve used with my geese without issues” and fendbendazole which I haven’t tried.
As for wether to pre treat or treat only when there’s an issue I don’t really know, I guess it’s a matter of preference.

Thank you! Is the infectious bronchitis vaccine not a live one then? My one vet didn't seem to be familiar with goose vaccines, but she might have been confused with what I was asking, too, because I think she thought I was asking for vaccines against metal illness, lol.

Is albendazole sold at farm supply stores, too? And how do you personally do it, pretreat or treat after? I guess if it doesn't hurt them, pretreating could be better to help prevent. But I was also just thinking I'd rather not give them medications if they don't need it?

From what I know CaEDTA is the chelation therapy, I gave it to my gander by injection into the right breast muscle every 12 hours for 5 days until we found out his test results showed he was negative for metals in his blood, we suspected he had swallowed lead and that was why he had no control of his legs, turns out that wasn’t the issue.
It has to be given by injection because if it’s given orally it can hasten the absorption of lead into the bloodstream. I think it’s their own digestive acid that dissolves the metal, unless there’s something else that does that that I don’t know about.

According to this site CaEDTA is better suited to scrubbing out lead than other metals https://advancednaturopathic.com/ne...heavy-metal-toxicity-diagnosis-and-treatment/

“Depending on the chelating agent used, it is either given intravenously, as is the case with calcium EDTA and DMPS, or orally using DMSA. Each chelating agent has a certain affinity for the different toxic metals: EDTA is best to pull out lead and aluminum, DMPS had the highest affinity for mercury, and DMSA is the best broad-spectrum chelator”

So the best chelating agent would depend on what that wire is made from, and without knowing what it’s composition is it’s hard to say which one should be used.

Without removing the wire they still might be able to tell what it’s composition is by testing her blood for metals, whichever is elevated is the culprit.

Yeah, from what I understood, CaEDTA is the chelation therapy! And I guess it helps her to dissolve the metal? But I wonder why they chose EDTA over DMSA since we don't know what the metal is made of. We're still waiting on the test results though as far as what it is and if it's in her blood or if it's just stuck in her gizzard and causing discomfort. She said they probably wouldn't find out till the end of the week, which is annoying that it takes so long.

Just a random guess but a lot of wire is made out of aluminum or aluminum/ copper, copper if it’s electrical wire, often it can be galvanized with zinc, so she might have elevated zinc in her system.

Oh, good to know! It's really a craps shoot as far as what it's from. Maybe she just chewed off some of the fencing around, though the vet made it sound like it's really thin (I don't have a full grasp on spatial reasoning with respect to the goose in real life and in the X-rays). So it could have been any trash in the ground from the previous owners, too. Sigh.


They decided to wait to do the second X-rays today, but I did make the 5-hour round trip to visit her yesterday, lol. Got to sit out in their backyard for a couple hours (then a bad thunderstorm rolled in unexpectedly from what my weather app had said earlier). Her limp is still bad, but she ate a little bit, and I had brought chopped carrots for her, too. The vet said this morning she also ate all her food from last night! So that was really good news, they didn't have to gavage feed her today. So fingers crossed the metal is dissolving, though if it is, the limping still concerns me.