Boer Goat Problems

[PennyJ]

I'm new to this site and new to raising goats. I've been doing a lot of reading here and in books about goats and was hoping for some opinions and insight.

We have some Boer nannies, wormy, some of them with bottle jaw. On 3/31 our vet came out to assess the situation and we have done the following per his advice: panacure for 3 days, and we gave thiamin and bo/se.

What we are seeing now is that some (about 4) of the nannies are still thin and have a swelling at their jaw. Also, most of the goats' back ends are dirty. The vet did a fecal and that exam came back with lung worm and slight coccidiosis. He recommended that we re-worm in a month and to wait a few days for the coccidiosis.

The kids seem fine, it's the moms who seem to be struggling. They seem to be lacking in that spunk that I was used to seeing in them. We have had lots of problems with kids but seem to have that under control now. I would appreciate any and all insight that anyone has. Also, the goats were wormed (can't remember with what, sorry) prior to kidding with an injectable.......we lost one as soon as she was injected. Vet said that that can happen 1 in every 10,000 times. That wormer didn't seem to do anything.

PennyJ in Illinois

[Backfourty,MI.]

I don't have boer goats but there are others here that do & they'll probly jump in here too, but I'm in Michigan & I use safeguard & ivermection for our goats, I use the safeguard once a year & the ivermectin the other times, that is how the vet suggested I do it & it seems to work for us here that way. I don't know about your kids though, How old are they?
Also I have no experience with bottle jaw or cocci but I'm sure the others with experience in those areas will help too.
Welcome to the forum too!

[PennyJ]

Thanks for the welcome,Backfourty. I have really been enjoying reading and learning here in the goat forum and elsewhere on this site.

The vet said that panacure is the same drug that is "safeguard". He also recommended that we put out safeguard blocks for the goats. Our local feed store has not put them out yet as they consider them a seasonal item.

The kids range in age from 1 week to 3 1/2 weeks. We lost quite a few. The last one we lost was on 3/31 and when the vet came out he posted it. He thought from what we described that it was goat polio that's why he prescribed the thiamin for the rest of the kids, and, it did turn out to be the polio. We were afraid of floppy kid sydrome.

We are not giving up, but this has been a very trying 6 months! I'm used to the cows and no problems! We've not ever had problems with our pygmies, either!!

PennyJ

[RiverPines]

IMO a new vet is needed to start with. Injecting wormer's is almost useless. Orally is the way to go.

What about the over all management, pens, shelter, diets etc?
Is there a good routine, well balanced diet with free choice good quality hay, fresh water and thorough daily management going on?

Thats a lot going wrong.

And invermection for lungworms. The stuff in safeguard doesn't work for lung worms and closer than a month for the second does. Injectable orally. I had one goat with lung worms when I bought it. 2 doses, 10 days apart and then another 3 weeks later. Haven't had any re-occurrence in over a year. Invermection injectable but given orally.

[PennyJ]

Thanks RiverPines. Yes, there is fresh water, vit/min., good hay, pen cleaned daily, and ample shelter.

We were not crazy about giving the injectable wormer, and this was from the opinion of a different vet at the same clinic as our regular vet was on call and could not be reached. Sometimes in life we have to learn the hard way, and, unfortunately that was one of those times.

At what rate did you give the ivomec?

[EasyDay]

I second what RiverPines said...I'd first look into a new vet...one who understands the goat metabolism. Almost everything is given orally to goats... pour ons, injections, etc.

There are several good goat sites out there, but I have read this site:
http://www.fiascofarm.com/goats/index.htm
extensively the last several days due to problems with our wether. I believe you may find info you need to fill the gaps in your knowledge. Scroll down to the table of contents.

But, you sure came to the right forum to ask questions! My wether is still alive, thanks to the folks here on the HT goat forum.

[RiverPines]

Originally Posted by PennyJ

Thanks RiverPines. Yes, there is fresh water, vit/min., good hay, pen cleaned daily, and ample shelter.

We were not crazy about giving the injectable wormer, and this was from the opinion of a different vet at the same clinic as our regular vet was on call and could not be reached. Sometimes in life we have to learn the hard way, and, unfortunately that was one of those times.

At what rate did you give the ivomec?

I dont remember back when I had the lungworm in that one goat. It was the only time I used injectable orally.

Now, I am using pour on orally, 2ml for each 22 pounds of weight.
How often depends on the worms. Vet can check that to instruct us as some worms are quick to get rid of and some more persistent needing several close spaced doses.

[MisFitFarm]

We have had Boers for three years, and we use Cydectin. It is a pour on wormer for cattle, but you use it orally for goats. We give it 1cc per 10 pounds of body weight, and it works great. Now, when you have bottle jaw, you have to treat more aggressively. You are going to have to worm them daily, for three days. You also need to give them NutriDrench during that time. This is what we do, others may disagree, or have different methods. But this is what works for us.

Do you have any way of moving your goats to another area? If you can worm them as I suggested, then move them to another area for a while, you will have better luck. As long as your goats are in the same pen all the time, you will have more problems with parasites. Good luck!

[fishhead]

I gave my goats a series of Valbazen 3x with a 10 day interval between doses. The chronic cough that one goat had disappeared. The purpose of the wait between doses is to allow the new worms to reach a stage where the wormer will kill them but not so long they mature and produce eggs. I don't know why a person would dose on 3 consecutive days.

Are the kids nursing? Without grain or alfalfa that might be why the does are declining. If they are scouring now probably isn't the time to introduce grain.

Have you given them probiotics? Baking soda?

It sounds like you lost the one goat from anaphylactic shock? Some people keep a syringe of ?? on hand for that.

[MisFitFarm]

Originally Posted by fishhead

I don't know why a person would dose on 3 consecutive days.

Because that's what the Vet told us to do, and it worked. These were goats that we bought with unknown treatment history.

[DQ]

safegaurd/panacur is widely considered useless to goats. and goats can rarely get enough of anything from a block of any sort. they require significantly higher qantities of most wormers than other animals. for example. they require 4x the horse dose of safegaurd (if it is even effective at all). yet they are 1/10 the size. even if safegaurd is still effective in your area the likelyhood that they could get an adequate amount from a block is very small. the bottle jaw is from anemia due to worms. I would treat with cydectin and ivermectin plus as others have suggested and get some injectable iron to help build the blood back up for those individuals who are anemic. dry lot them for now and feed hay off the ground to prevent reinfestation with parasites. expect to waste hay. don't make them eat it off the ground. I would give (the reccomended amount) a high fiber feed medicated to manage coccidioses to get some high quality calories in them (not grain). dose with pepto bismol until you get the diahrea under control. (assuming that the goats back ends are dirty due to loose stool and not becuase they are still cleaning after birth which they can do for weeks) this would only be advice based on my still limited knowledge. I hope some of the super experienced people will chime in. keep this at the top of the page.

I don't know yours but you will find that most vets no little about goats. most of the info they have is extrapolated from research on sheep or cattle. and as recent research has found they are very different in practice. I have found the information coming directly from successful producers to be way more valuable than the vets advice. the vets tend to be far behind in most respects. if you can get your herd healthy and follow certain guidelines they can be easy to manage don't give up.

[Rockytopsis]

"The vet said that panacure is the same drug that is "safeguard". "

In my area "safegurad" is only good for tapewormes and is given 3 days in a row to cure tapeworms. I use Cydectin pour on for cattle as a oral wormer at the rate of 1cc per 22 pounds. If the goat has a heavy infestation I reworm again in 7-10 days.

[fishhead]

Originally Posted by MisFitFarm

Because that's what the Vet told us to do, and it worked. These were goats that we bought with unknown treatment history.

Maybe there's a difference in the lifecycles of different worms?

[MisFitFarm]

Originally Posted by fishhead

Maybe there's a difference in the lifecycles of different worms?

Distinct possibility. Also the geographical area makes a big difference. As Rockytopsis said, in my area Safeguard is only used for tapeworms, it just isn't affective on anything else. We just had a Goat Producers meeting last month, with speakers from the Dept. of Ag, and one of the Universities. They didn't know much, the audience gave them more information than they gave us!

I was always told that Valbazen could cause abortions?

[Vicki McGaugh TX Nubians]

The problem with this is you can't see lungworm on a fecal, it takes a special test and having just ran it I can tell you a normal vet doesn't do this test (Bareman). Also as far north as you are and you are already having blood sucking worms, your problems are at crisis mode...blood sucking worms are always the culprit in bottlejaw, because it isn't worms causing the bottle jaw it is the anemia from them sucking the blood that you are seeing with swelling. Now you are having diarrhea, next dehydration with the anemia, then deaths.

Safeguard is not going to kill blood sucking worms. What your vet said was lungworms are actually HC worms and maybe liverflukes, because even some vets can't tell them apart. You need to purchase cydectin cattle pouron...jefferspet.com has the best prices. Don't guess your weights, if you don't have a scale go heavy with a weigh tape, do not under dose by guessing low on the goats weights. If you are new, you likely don't yet have an eye for weights. Give the Cydectin orally to each goat, and with this much problem this early in the year, I would repeat the dosages in 10 days, then 10 days again. IF you can keep the herd out of their pens, yards, pastures and barn for 12 hours after worming that will help...I use a worm pen, an area of the backyard that I can close off with 3 cattle panels, once the goats are out of this pen in 12 hours, it becomes part of our mowed backyard that the hens scratch through during the day. This way all the worms that abandon ship alive are not just reifesting you pastures and barns.

You need to revamp your worming program...dealing with copper issues? Not feeding on the ground, and worming before your does are barn bound for the winter...because they are harboring HC worms over the winter. As the does kid in the spring overwintered (arrested larve in the doe which are asleep during the winter) become activated from the hormones of her kidding and she then sheds millions of worms in to the soil and bedding of the barns, and you will lose kids who are not born with immunity to worms. Down south without freeze, the first rains bring puddles and dew up to the tops of the grass, where overwintered larve lived all winter. The first grass the does eat contain thousands of larve and eggs, to reinfest the does. It's vicious. vicki

[Goat Servant]

Fishead was talking about epinephrine to give for anaphylactic shock.

[ALLRKIDS]

Vicki
How much cydentin to you give orally? How many cc's per how many lbs?

[PennyJ]

Thank you everyone for your responses. It is haemonchus worms. We are planning on trying the cydectin. Lost another kid today. We had one kid that was extremely weak and I was feeding her pedialyte with baking soda in it. I've been reading a lot here about having baking soda available for the herd. I'm sorry if I have too many questions, but, I have lots of questions. Just regular baking soda that I'd buy at the grocery store? How do I put it out for them? Is it mixed in with their water? Or, is it given "dry"?

We do feed off of the ground and that seems to be a common theme that I'm glad to know we've been doing right. Why do these Boer goats seem to have so many more problems than our pygmy goats? We've had pygmy goats for over 8 years and have never had any problems with them at all. Is what we are going through typical? I feel awful for these animals and awful that they don't feel well. They are such kind and gentle creatures.

I've not ever heard of loose vitmans/minerals. Where does a person find these? How do they get fed? How often? The goats get all they can eat of good quality alfalfa and we have out goat mineral blocks. I've noticed that these blocks don't seem to be a good thing because their tongues aren't like a cows/rough.

I appreciate all of the responses as it keeps me on my toes and learning!!!

PennyJ

[XCricketX]

Penny... get a loose mineral called "Onyx now" That is what Ozark Jewels (Emily) recommended to me. Leave it out constantly (and protected from rain).

I'm glad that you started this thread.. because I'm not too familiar with goat worms yet and this is very informative! I've been using Cydectin as well... it took away a bottle jaw case I had.

I hope your goats get better soon!!!!!

Cricket

[Minelson]

Yes...regular Arm & Hammer baking soda in the orange box. I buy a big bag of ot at Sam's club. I have a little feeder I put it in next to the loose minerals. Just dump a pile in. My goats get Purina Goat minerals loose along with a cattle mineral block. They like the block best and I see them licking it a lot. They don't really like the purina goat mineral so I won't be buying that again...but will always provide some kind of loose mineral along with the block...