Lets talk about goats!

[Stacykins]

I appreciate the advice you guys gave me. My goat is doing much better now. Antibiotics are working great. We gave him the lice treatment from the vet gave us, and then did a DE treatment. His poop test was negative for parasites, which was good. His lungs were clear when I listened to them the day I picked him up. I also didnt even think to check for lice.
This breeder does an "all natural" goat care. I have watched this little guy grow up. I didn't want to get goats not knowing how to care for them, so I went there about every other week to see the little guy and observe care. Unfortunately after becoming "friends" with these guys I took their word that he was in good health even though my better judgement told me otherwise.
I will never buy another goat from them. I'm gong to eat the vet bill, and count it as a lesson learned. I'm just glad my little guy is doing good now, and has a friend to play with ;-)

Has he been given a round of deworming? And a coccidia treatment? FYI, worming and treatment for coccidia are not the same thing! If the breeders were all natural nuts who let him get full of lice, he likely has a worm load, and most definitely a coccidia load.

 

[ChickyChickens]

Has he been given a round of deworming? And a coccidia treatment? FYI, worming and treatment for coccidia are not the same thing! If the breeders were all natural nuts who let him get full of lice, he likely has a worm load, and most definitely a coccidia load.

X2

 

[RTFchickens]

The vet did a fecal test for worms that came back negative. Would the cocidia show up in the poop too? The vet knew that the breeder was into all natural, and didnt do deworming treatment, so I told her to check for everything. That's how I got the almost $200 bill from vet.

 

[H Diamond]

The vet did a fecal test for worms that came back negative. Would the cocidia show up in the poop too? The vet knew that the breeder was into all natural, and didnt do deworming treatment, so I told her to check for everything. That's how I got the almost $200 bill from vet.

Yes, cocci will show up in a fecal as well. If he counted the parasite eggs, he should have seen if there was cocci in there.

 

[Fancychooklady]

We purchased a flock of 33 angora and they were lousy. Best get yourself a good lice powder and some safeguard . My goat first aid box consists of:
Hoof clipping shears
Lice powder
Safeguard
Terramycin antibiotic spray
Terramycin eye ointment
Activated charcoal
Epsom salts
Sodium ascorbate
Magnesium
Vet wrap
Betadine
Caro and cooking oil/ molasses
20 ml syring

 

[cassie]

We purchased a flock of 33 angora and they were lousy. Best get yourself a good lice powder and some safeguard . My goat first aid box consists of:
Hoof clipping shears
Lice powder
Safeguard
Terramycin antibiotic spray
Terramycin eye ointment
Activated charcoal
Epsom salts
Sodium ascorbate
Magnesium
Vet wrap
Betadine
Caro and cooking oil/ molasses
20 ml syring

Two other things no goat medicine chest should ever be without. One is GasX for bloat. Works much better than, and is a lot safer than, oil or anything else I have tried including Thera-Bloat.. Two is clostridium perfingens antitoxin. Entero is a true emergency. It can strike at any time without warning, and kills very quickly. A prompt dose of antitoxin is necessary to save the life of the animal.

 

[ekavi]

Is there any way to take care of goats without use of any synthetic medications?

 

[Fancychooklady]

Two other things no goat medicine chest should ever be without.  One is GasX for bloat.  Works much better than, and is a lot safer than, oil or anything else I have tried including Thera-Bloat..  Two is clostridium perfingens antitoxin.  Entero is a true emergency. It can strike at any time without warning, and kills very quickly. A prompt dose of antitoxin is necessary to save the life of the animal.

Entero toxemia ( pulpy kidney ) is caused by the organism ' clostridium welchii ' and or ' perfringens ' D. Both are inhabitants of the gut. Only when the goat is under nutritional or other stress- usually worms - do they start to proliferate and in turn give off the deadly toxin. Worming goats is an essential part of goat husbandry.

 

[Fancychooklady]

Is there any way to take care of goats without use of any synthetic medications?

Pat Colebys ' Natural goat & alpaca care ' second edition is a good source , but I'm yet to see an all natural wormer that works. I use Terramycin in foot abscesses , eye infection and horn loss. It is the most valuable item in my first aid box. We use it on poultry, horses , dogs and goats.

 

[cassie]

Entero toxemia ( pulpy kidney ) is caused by the organism ' clostridium welchii ' and or ' perfringens ' D. Both are inhabitants of the gut. Only when the goat is under nutritional or other stress- usually worms - do they start to proliferate and in turn give off the deadly toxin. Worming goats is an essential part of goat husbandry.

Entero is not nearly as predictable or preventable as that. Stress is certainly a factor but this is something you can't always control. I have never found worms to be a factor, but I am not saying they can't be. I have seen entero in goats of all ages and under very different management conditions. I've seen it in kids as young as a week. Sometimes you know the cause but sometimes you don't. Maybe the kid got too much milk. Maybe it was too hot. Maybe the goat got a little too much grain. I Maybe the hay was richer than what it was used to. Maybe the moon and stars were in the correct alignment. Sometimes there is no way to know the cause. I have found that kids being fed milk replacer are more prone to entero than kids on milk, but kids on milk can and do die from entero also. Soil pH seems to be a factor. Before I moved to the San Joaquin Valley I lived near the coast and we almost never saw a case of entero.
Where I lived in the San Joaquin Valley of California the soil was alkaline. Entero there was so common that if a goat of any age appeared sick you treated it for entero and then worried about what else might be wrong with it. Vaccination with clostridium perfingens toxoid greatly reduces th incidence of entero but it does not eliminate it.

Entero is something you should be prepared for. A bottle of antitoxin is cheap insurance. If you never need it, fine and dandy. But if you do, you need it NOW!! In case you think I am talking through my hat, I raised dairy goats for over 40 years and had a commercial goat dairy for quite a few of those years. I lived in an area where there were many many goat herds. Some were commercial dairies and some were hobby herds. So my observations are based on observation of a large number of goats over a period of many years. By necessity, entero is something, for better or worse, I know a fair bit about.