The family. We are a strange little band of characters trudging through life, sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that binds us all together.

- Erma Bombeck

Monday, April 30, 2012

Injured Piglet

I try to check on the piglets several times a day so that I can head off anything at the first sign of trouble.  Yesterday morning there was one piglet - a very small one - who seemed to be limping quite badly on her hind leg.  I picked her up and found two deep lacerations with an open flap of skin between them on her lower leg.  It was warm and swollen, quite obviously infected.

I brought her in the house.  It is nearly impossible to do anything near the pen with a piglet as they cry for Ruby and she gets very upset.  Once they are out of earshot, the piglet can cry and momma is fine.  I washed out the cut as best I could with Dr. Bronner's soap.  The piglet hated it.  I didn't like it much either.  Once clean, I filled the lacerations with triple antibiodic ointment, cut a small piece of vet wrap, and wrapped the leg so that she would still have full range of motion.

Last year, we had a piglet get injured in a similar fashion.  We suppose that this cut is caused when momma accidentally steps on the piglet's leg and her hoof cuts the tender skin.  Last year, I did just what I said above and then I put the baby back out with Ruby.  Last year, that piglet was dead in the morning.

So this year, I followed up the cleaning and bandaging with the tiniest dose of LA 200.  Literally, I gave her 0.1mL of it via IM injection.  Her little body couldn't be more than two pounds and the dosage was so small I had a hard time feeling like I had administered it at all.  But it must've done something.

This morning, she seemed to be putting weight on her leg.  And by this evening, she had gotten the bandage off (always happens) and was walking on it without a problem.  The cut is still visible, but the swelling has subsided and she seems to be doing fine.  Lesson learned.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Another One Down

I should've known that Little Plow wouldn't be strong enough to make it through a night outside with momma.  Maybe I did but I was tired.  I knew that he would have to be on his game to make sure that he didn't end up crushed under Ruby when she went to bed.

When I came out to feed him this morning, he had passed.  His little body was buried under some of the straw bedding.  Without much pomp and circumstance, I tossed his little body as far out into the juniper and sage as I could.  My hope is that the coyotes will find him before the dogs.

Now there are ten piglets.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Surrogate Momma

Well, when we checked on the piglet last evening, we found that he was in with daddy.  He seems to be drawn to any grunting noise, regardless of the caller.  Since daddy really isn't going to provide this little guy with much nourishment, I brought him back inside to bottle feed.

We supplemented a couple of piglets last year that weren't growing as quickly as the rest, but this one is different.  I cannot seem to get him to suck on the nipple at all.  He chomps on it.  He chews on it.  He fights for it.  He definitely is getting milk into his belly, but it is an inefficient (and messy) system he has worked out.  When he is hungry, he smacks his lips together like a packman looking for dots.  It's hilarious.

J went to bed early so I decided to snuggle the piglet awhile and get him settled for bed in a small cardboard box.  He would not hear of it...or rather, I would not have heard the end of it from him if I had abandoned him in the box.  I thought about going out and grabbing a couple more piglets from momma, but I really didn't feel like going outside again in the dark.  So I did what any pig farmer would do, I wrapped him up in a blanket and snuggled him into our bed with me.

Just like any kid sleeping in their parent's bed, he probably was doing just fine - getting lots of rest.  I, on the other hand, was constantly waking up to adjust him or listen to him.  He found a nice little spot under my chin and fell asleep for awhile.  I thought we might just have it worked out when he decided that he needed to walk around a bit.

He was next to my head on my pillow...actually in my hair, when I felt this warmth radiating from the fabric below him.  HE PEED ON MY HEAD!!!!  That was it.  It was 2:30 in the morning and I needed some uninterrupted sleep.  I put him in the box next to the bed and put in my iPod earbuds.  I turned on some white noise and fell happily asleep.  I don't know if he made noise or not.  But he was alive and well this morning.

I fed him several times before finally taking him out to momma.  I wanted to wait until it was warm outside so that even if he wandered off, he would be ok.  The boys checked on him a few times throughout the afternoon.  I went out about once an hour (half as much as I should have been) and wrestled some milk into his chompy mouth.

I watched him several times try to get in to nurse when Ruby let the babies.  But I never actually saw him make contact with a nipple.  I'm encouraged that he was willing to get in there and try.  I will obviously be supplementing him (most likely until weaning age) but I like the idea that he may eventually get momma's milk too.

He is outside with momma tonight.  It is peaceful in here without the little grunt.  I only hope he stays snuggled up with his family.  We'll see in the morning.

Monday, April 23, 2012

24: Pig Style

Sunday
2:00pm
R comes home to find J snuggling with a piglet (something he doesn't do without cause).  Turns out that this piglet was found in a mud puddle made by his momma when she dumped her water over to cool down.  The piglet is ver cool to the touch and basically unresponsive.

3:00pm
R settles into her own snuggle, holding the piglet skin to skin in a "kangaroo care" fashion.  She starts to call friends for advice.  One person suggests she simply let the piglet die.  :-(

4:00pm
R mixes up some gatorade and feeds the baby via syringe drench.  There's not much response.

5:00pm
R passes the snuggle piglet off to K and goes out to make some kind of shelter for Ruby and the piglets as she is not in the right pen and has no shelter.  It begins to thunder, lightening, and rain.

6:00pm
R's friend comes out to help with the shelter.  They fashion something with a table and a tarp that Ruby seems to be ok with.  The plug in a heat lamp, even though it means 300watts of energy per hour!

7:00pm
R decides to try a warm water bath with the piglet.  It seems to help.  She dries the piglet off and gives her more oral electrolytes.

8:00pm
The boys head to bed and R settles in with the piglet, a hot water bottle, and a good book...prepared for the long haul.

9:00pm
J gets home from work and decides to go out to check on the piglets and the shelter.  He comes back inside with a second piglet, very cold and shaking.  R begins the same process with this little piglet, warming him in a warm water bath.  He begins to sieze.  She doesn't hold a lot of hope.  J decides to bring all of the piglets inside for the night to make sure that they stay warm enough.

10:00pm
J brings the piglets inside but we're missing two.  He goes back out to check for them and finds them crushed under the table, very cold.  We put the healthy eleven into a dog crate lined with straw and snuggle the other two into a few blankets and the hot water bottle, and R heads to bed.

11:00pm
J removes the hot water bottle and goes to bed.

12:00pm
R checks on the babies.  All fine.

1:00am
R checks on the babies.  She snuggles the two back into their blankets.

2:00am
R checks on the babies.  All fine.

3:00am
R checks on the babies.  Some grouching from the crate, but all are fine.

4:00am
J checks on the babies.  The two chilly ones don't look good.

5:00am
R checks on the babies.  The two chilly ones are dead.  Everyone else is fine.

6:00am
R begins to move the babies into a laundry basket to take them out to momma.  She finds the bottom piglet unresponsive.  It is warm but she suspects asfixiation.  She wraps the baby up in a blanket.

7:00am
R takes the piglets back out to their momma in the laundry basket and they happily greet and start snacking.

8:00am
R returns with the piglet in hand from dropping the kids off at school to meet the mobile slaughter truck.  It's here for Freightliner and Oreo.

9:00am
R goes inside to feed the piglet.  He actually takes some milk from the bottle.

10:00am
R and the piglet snuggle.

11:00am
R and the piglet prepare to head into school to man the book fair.

12:00pm
R and the piglet are told that they cannot stay at the school together.  She decides to put the piglet in the car during the fair...it's nice and warm but not too warm for the piggie.

1:00pm
R checks on the piglet in the car.  She feeds the baby a bit of milk and goes back to the fair.

2:00pm
R and the kids head home with the piglet.  R and J manage to move Ruby and Jaws into opposite pens so that Ruby will have her own shelter.  R takes the piglet out to his momma.  He seems to be doing ok with the other piglets but is a bit confused about who his momma is.  We'll continue to check on him throughout the afternoon to make sure he's ok.  But it looks like he'll do fine.

Saturday, April 21, 2012

One Piglet Lost to An Umbilical Hernia

I found a dead piglet this afternoon.  I had noticed yesterday that there was a piglet showing signs of a small hernia near the umbilicus.  Ruby was nosing him to see if he would move, but he was already gone.

I did a little more research into why naval hernias occur and this is what I found.

Of many congenital abnormalities, ruptures at the umbilicus or the inguinal canal are most common. They are considered to be developmental defects yet have a very low heritability. Umbilical hernias can sometimes be traced back to a particular boar in which case he should be culled. Environmental factors can increase the incidence of umbilical hernias and if there is a problem (more than 2% of pigs) consider the following:
  • Are prostaglandins used to synchronise farrowings. If so check that piglets are not being pulled away from the sow at farrowing and the cord stretched abnormally.
  • Is navel bleeding occurring on the farm? Are naval clips being used to prevent bleeding? If so make sure they are not placed close up to the skin otherwise the tissues will be damaged and weakened.
  • Identify the precise time when the ruptures appear. Do these coincide with a change of housing.
  • In veranda type housing where the pigs pass through a small hole to the dunging area sudden severe abdominal pressure may cause ruptures.
  • Are stocking densities high and increase abdominal pressure?
  • In cold weather do the pigs huddle thereby increasing abdominal pressure.
  • Check records to see if the boar and the sow are related.
  • If the rupture is large and the pig is on a concrete floor or slats it should be moved to a soft bedded area so that the overlying skin does not become sore and ulcerated.
  • Examine navels at births and two days later to see if there are any abnormalities.
Inguinal ruptures are not as important a problem unless they become very large.

                                                                         - from www.thepigsite.com

In consideration of the above information, there are two things that come to mind.  The first is that I had some trouble with the umbilical cord bleeding on a few piglets.  I'm not sure what determines how the umbilicus breaks, but when I cut them I make sure to leave about two inches of the cord so that the bleeding stops quickly.  I only cut umbilical cords if they are super long and causing trouble...like the piglet is tripping on it or getting tangled with others.  I wonder if the cord would naturally tear off at the skin level if ripped away with force instead of being cut.  That might be why I had a few very short cords and some bleeding.

The second factor that might be a factor is the cold.  I'm not sure what they consider "cold" but our piglets are living without a heat lamp at night and that would be pretty chilly for any piglet as they prefer upwards of 90 degrees.  This piglet could have died in the night.

The hernia had completely ruptured though...I don't know if that might have happened with a crush injury, something that could easily have happened.  Ruby is such a great momma but she is so big and those babies are so little.

So far, the final fifteen seem to be doing well.  I still think that I will need to pull at least four of them and bottle feed just to give the others a better chance with nursing.  Having twelve teats and fifteen babies means somebody is always missing out.  I'd rather drop it down to have a few extra teats.  I will watch the babies for a few more days and decide who looks like they need the most help...and then supplement them with bottles.  They will continue to live with momma and their siblings, but I will feed them in addition to them having access to nurse if they want.

Eprinex Take Two

This note is more for me than anyone...I dosed the goats for their second time with Eprinex.  It has been exactly fourteen days from the last dose so we should be getting any lice that hatched between the first dose and now.  It was a bit tricky to get the meds onto Ares, our buckling.  He is definitely a dam-raised buckling and is shy of any attention from humans.  It makes it harder to treat him, but with the help of the kids (two-legged type), we got it done.

The does are fat and heavy with babies now.  I can see that Asha's udder is starting to fill in and I think it will be a beautiful udder when she is fully freshened.  Stitch and Tumbleweed (who are both more Boer than milker) also have nice looking udders.  I think I might try to shave them tomorrow as Stitch in particular has some very long hair.  It makes it so much easier to clean up after the birth if they are shaved.

Friday, April 20, 2012

What To Do With Day Old Piglets

The first item on our agenda after the babies were born today was to trim up the umbilical cords and check the babies over for any obvious problems.  Once that was done, I spent a lot of time just helping the babies to find a teat and get some milk in them.  This was tricky for us as Ruby only has twelve working teats and sixteen working babies.  It means that there will always be a couple of piglets without something to eat.  Today that isn't much of a problem because the babies are so tired from the birth that half of them are asleep at a time.  They might be walking and then they are asleep.  It's like a war zone with little sleeping piglets strewn all over the place.  The piglet in the picture was walking over her brother when a snooze caught her.

After giving the babies some time to eat and sleep, we made sure that Ruby had food and water.  She was pretty warm in the sun so I gently wet her down with water from a bucket.  It wasn't enough and she had to go lie down in a mud puddle - not the best idea with a bunch of babies following you, but she did it and everyone survived.

It is SO much easier to handle the babies on the first day.  The momma is tired so she doesn't react very much to a squealing baby.  The babies are tired so they often fall asleep in your hands when you pick them up.  These two things mean that it's best to address needle teeth and iron supplements on day one.

Last year I described how to clip needle teeth.  But it's pretty easy.  There are eight teeth altogether and the only reason you clip them is to avoid piglets injuring each other or their momma.  We used nail clippers and just cut the tips off each tooth to make them flat.  The teeth have an odd brownish tint to them that makes me think they may be dying the minute the baby is born.  They do bleed, however, so they must still be partially alive.

When the needle teeth are clipped, J and I give the babies 2ml of iron supplement orally.  I bought the injectable kind this year, but was afraid that there wasn't enough "M" (muscle) to give the shot "IM" (intramuscular).  These babies are a bit on the small size...probably due to how many Ruby was carrying and the fact that we didn't have her on a free-choice diet because she was sharing her pen with other pigs.

The babies don't like the taste of the iron...at least they don't look like they like it.  You have to be careful not to push it in too quickly and allow the baby to aspirate the liquid.  I found that if I divided the dose into four small pushes, we could get most of it to stay in the baby and not end up on our hands.

An added benefit to doing the oral iron supplement at the same time as needle teeth is that you have a visual marker of who still needs to be done.  The babies do not like to stay in one place for very long and no matter how effecient we were, we never really knew if we had a new piglet in our hands until we saw the orange foam around their mouth.

Goose Is In Solitary

I got tired of having to reach under our broody goose to retrieve chicken eggs so tonight we put her in a wire cage with food and water.  She is NOT pleased with her new accomodations and has threatened to complain to upper management if it is not rectified quickly.  Unfortunately for her, upper management is in my pocket.  She's stuck for the next few days.

Piglets, piglets, and more piglets!

This morning we awoke to K telling us that we'd better get up because Ruby had her babies and two of them were dead.  Not a great way to start the day.  Especially since I spent a long time last night trying to coax Ruby into the now-vacant goat pen so that she could farrow in peace.  Instead, she had Jaws, the daddy, two of her older daughters (about 200 pounds each), and two goats in with her for the event.  It's no wonder that we were losing piglets.
I got dressed and headed out to the pig pen.  Goodness sakes, there were a lot of piglets!  I went to work clipping umbilical cords and cleaning up the afterbirth (something that the chickens thought was a wonderful treat, bleck).  I counted seventeen babies in all...and yes, two were dead.  One was very small, maybe the runt.  The other was pretty average.  There were no noticable marks so our best guess is a crush injury.  Especially with three other pigs in the pen...it would be easy for a baby to be in the wrong place and get smooshed.
One of the babies seemed very lethargic and kept walking away from momma to lie down.  I picked her up and her umbilical cord was dripping blood.  I think it may have broken off too short and was allowing a lot of blood loss, which would account for her lethargy.  I decided to give her a quick boost and went over to Lilo, our milking doe, to get some warm, fresh milk for her.
While I was over with Lilo, Z shouted that we need to do a recount on the babies.  J and I told him that we were sure that we had counted correctly and there were only fifteen still alive and with momma.  Then J asked Z if there was one that was covered in slime...and sure enough, Ruby had just delivered the eighteenth baby!  I pulled the amniotic sack off of her and put her close to Ruby's belly where she began to root for a snack almost immediately.
I gave the little girl a drink of milk, which was not something she really wanted, and then set her back down.  She slowly wandered back over to momma.  I will keep an eye on her, but I would rather Ruby raise the babies than me.
After that, we broke open a fresh bale of straw and rebedded the nest Ruby had made.  She is in the pen without a shelther (thus the reason I wanted to move her last night).  We have a small shelter in there that the babies could go into if they get cold, but I want to do everything we can to make sure that they stay warm enough during the night.  Usually, I would have a heat lamp running 24/7 so that if the babies get cold, they can huddle under the heat lamp.  But life is different when you live off-grid.  One heat lamp for one hour is the equivalent of ten hours of the fridge.

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Hatching Chicks at Home

I was in the feed store this morning, on my way somewhere else with the family, when a gal asked me a question about hatching her own chickens at home. I couldn't help but talk with her for a few minutes (even though everyone in the car was waiting). I didn't get to share all of my thoughts with her, but I thought I might share them here.
When you want to allow a hen to hatch eggs out at home, you first need to make sure that your eggs are fertilized.  This means that the hens have access to a rooster.  And the general rule says that you want about one rooster for every twelve hens to make sure you have ample coverage.  Of course, you can also just buy fertilized eggs from someone else (or even from a hatchery) and skip the roo altogether.

So, with your hens getting love from their roo and the weather getting warmer, you will eventually find a hen that is "going broody."  This means that she has decided now is a good time to hatch eggs.  Many breeds of chicken are specifically designed not to be broody...because when they brood, they stop laying eggs.  Cochins are well-known for their broodiness, so they may be a good bet for hatching eggs at home.

And just because you use a cochin for an egg momma, doesn't mean that all of her babies need to be cochins.  You can choose any eggs you collect from your flock and put them under a broody hen.  It is best to choose good-sized, nicely shaped, clean eggs.  Do not wash them or refrigerate them before putting them under your broody hen.  Refrigerating can kill the embryo and washing them takes the protective bloom off of the egg, making the embryo susceptible to outside bacteria.

When I decide to let a hen "set" (hatch out her eggs), I usually give her a week of setting wherever she chose to go broody.  Then I move her and the nest to a cage where I can control the environment a little more.  Right now I have a broody hen who chose a nesting box about four feet off of the ground.  She might like it for safety now, but her babies are going to have a long fall when they first start to leave the nest...and they won't be able to get back up there with momma at nighttime.  So I will move her and the nest into a crate on the ground.

If you make sure that your hen is committed to brooding (i.e. she has been doing this for at least a week) then moving her and the nest won't be too big of a deal.  I use a shallow box to place the nest in.  I get my hubby to hold the hen - who will be very mad through the whole process - while I scoop up the nest and arrange it in the box.  I then put the box in the crate along with a feeder and waterer, and then hubby places the hen in the crate and we lock it.  She may stomp around for a few minutes, but eventually she will settle back down on her nest.  I then cover the front of the crate with a sheet or a towel.  Hens like to be in dark, quiet places when they brood.

Keep track of approximately how many days your hen has been setting on the eggs consistently.  About 21 days later, you should have babies hatching out.  After 23-24 days, you need to remove any eggs that haven't hatched.  If none of them did, you can try to sneak day-old chicks under her, but I've never had any luck with it.  A better way of keeping track is by candling the eggs every few days.  This way you can see clearly which eggs are progressing and which ones are duds.

Once the babies have hatched, you have a choice.  Momma can raise them in the crate for quite awhile, but I tend to let her and the babies out within the first three days.  She will keep them warm and make sure that they get enough to eat.  She will protect them as best she can (although you will have a higher mortality if you don't keep them in the cage).  And as they grow, they will know that this place is home.

Breaking a Brooding Chicken

This time of year is when you will have hens "go broody."  This means that your once well-behaved, lay-an-egg-a-day, mild-mannered chicken changes into something completely different.  She sits in a nesting box for hours on end.  She fluffs up her feathers and growls (yes, chickens can growl) at you whenever you come near.  She stops laying eggs and instead protects whatever eggs she may have under her.  Sometimes, other hens will sit in the box with her and lay new eggs to add to her "clutch."  When you reach for the eggs, she will peck at you.  Hard.  And if you do manage to steal the eggs out from under her and throw her out into the yard to get a drink, she runs around with her wings out and her hackles up clucking at everyone, as if they care what she's doing.
If you raise chickens for eggs, it can be bothersome to have a hen go broody because it means that she will not be laying for the duration of her "condition."  There are lots of theories on how to break a broody chicken out of her desire to hatch eggs.  Most of them include cooling the chicken's belly off.  This is because broody hens increase the temperature that they radiate from below.  I think this may be why they wait until the weather warms up for brooding...it makes staying warm easier (although you'll always have the nutcase chicken who tries to hatch babies in the dead of winter).  You can try ice cubes in her nest.  You can dunk her belly in cool water (as long as it's warm outside, so she doesn't catch a cold).  My method is to use a dog crate or rabbit cage.  I call it the "brooding box."

When I have a hen start to brood and I am not interested in chicks, I relocate that hen to a crate or cage without any bedding.  No straw, no shavings, no towel.  Nothing.  I give her a waterer and a feeder.  The amount of time that she must stay in solitary is completely up to her, but it usually takes three or four days.  I can tell she's ready to come out when she doesn't react to me reaching in for her food or water.  If I accidentally misread the signs and let her out too early...I'll know because she'll go back to the nesting boxes.  In that case, she gets a few more days in solitary.  NEVER would I recommend withholding food or water from a chicken.  She will get over it but she needs to keep up her strength.

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Egg Theives

We occasionally run into the problem of theivery on the farm.  Not your average burglar...we have dogs to take care of that.  I'm talking about egg theives.  They come in a variety of sizes.  We've had rats running through the coop.  They're tricky to get rid of because you cannot really set traps for them without accidentally catching chickens.  We've had chickens eating eggs...the only cure for this one is culling.  Sounds brutal, but I've never met a chicken who tasted eggs and then voluntarily quit eating them.  We've even had dogs sneaking in and having a snack.

But recently, two new theives have made their presence known on the farm.  Pigs and crows.  Now, the pigs have been on the farm for quite awhile, but they have never had access to the chicken coop until now.  We had to put the pigs in the same pen as the coop when we first arrived at the new place.  It wasn't a problem for a long time.  I mean, I knew that they would occasionally get themselves an egg or two that was laid in their pen...but they never had a real supply.  And when they were in the pen with the coop, they couldn't get into the coop itself because the pop door was made to fit a chicken, not a pig.

But I misjudged the ingenuity of a pig.  I am sure that their reasoning went something like this...

Every day we see R come into our pen to feed us.  She then opens the big white door on the side of the coop and goes in.  When she comes out, she has a bucket full of eggs.  Therefore, if we open the big white door, we will find a bucket full of eggs!

And that is just what they did.  They rooted their tough little noses on my hollowcore door (which was not meant for such abuse) until they got a corner of it off.  Then they ripped at it until they had their own pig-sized pop door...and access to all of the eggs that they could eat.  As a bonus, they could also snack on all of the chicken poop that collected under the roosts.  Yes, our pigs (and probably any pigs given half the chance) eat chicken poop.  Truly "organically" fed.

My egg collection dropped to almost nill...as did the bedding in the nesting boxes because the bucks who share their quarters with the pigs and chickens, thought that the nesting boxes were a salad bar of goodness set up just for them.  Every time I would rebed the boxes, the goats would eat it. 

I eventually "fixed" my broken door with a couple of 2x4s placed strategically accross the doorway.  At some point, I want to replace the door, but at some point, I also want the pigs to have their own pen.

The crows were somewhat of a surprise.  I knew that they eat carrion, but I didn't know that they were egg theives.  We had a dead duck out by the pens one day that drew the attention of a few crows and all of a sudden, all of my outdoor nesting boxes were empty of eggs.  And if that weren't clue enough, the duck eggs that I was leaving under the goat feeder (just in case a duck went broody) disappeared overnight.  No broken shells.  No nothing.  It had to be the crows.  In retaliation, because I would not harm a wild animal without good cause, I let the boys loose with their bb guns to scare off any crows that they see.  They, of course, relish this mission as any young boy with a bb gun and nothing to shoot would.  I don't see crows as a problem in the near future.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Guck or Doose?

I have seen some amazing love run through my animals in the springtime.  The bucks wag their tongues and growl in a low moaning fashion to get the attention of their beautiful does.  The boars snort and grunt, pushing their sows around until they stand still for some nooky.  The roosters do their flashy dance, skimming the ground with their wings as they turn circles in front of their hens.  But today I saw a new kind of love.  Star-crossed lovers if you will.  A love between a duck and a goose.

We only have one goose and she tends to hang out by herself since losing her sister about a month ago.  We have a small flock of ducks...two drakes and four hens.  Apparently, Jill, our goose, has decided that she may as well join the flock.  I watched (a bit taken aback, to be honest) while Pong - one of the drakes - mounted her and tried for a good five minutes to make a love connection.  I thought for sure that Jill would object, but she didn't.  In fact, I watched her preen him later in the morning.

So maybe this is the start of a new generation of deese or gucks, as it may be.  J suggested we try to add a chicken to the mix and make our own version of the tur-duck-en...a goo-duck-en.  I'm not sure it's advisable to mess around with mther nature like that.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Eprinex for Cattle

I deloused the goats today.  All of them.  It didn't take very long.  Asha thought that there was some sort of conspiracy against her and she wanted nothing to do with it.  I finally tricked her in the pen by just scratching her head from across the feeder for awhile and then dosing the back of her neck with the other hand.  I'm sure Lilo thought that I was planning to milk her so she ran, but I caught her.

I thought I'd share some information about delousing goats.  Most goat owners have found that there are really very few products that are specifically labelled for use with goats.  This is a frustration felt by many.  The only thing that I have found to combat it, is to learn how to use drugs that are labelled for other livestock successfully with goats.

An example of this is dolouser.  I have used Co-Ral before, but there is a withdrawl period for milk and meat.  A friend suggested Eprinex Pour-On by Ivomec.  It has no withdrawl period for meat or milk and is very effective with biting lice on goats.  It is meant to handle internal and external parasites in cattle, but it only takes care of the external ones on goats.
The dosage is the same because it is determined by weight.  You won't need the huge syringe in the box, but you can use a small syringe minus the needle for administration.  1cc (1ml) per 22lbs.  My smaller goats are about 50 pounds, so I used a little over 2ccs.  My larger goats are around 125 pounds so I used around 5ccs.  The only one that I'm not sure about is the baby.  He's nowhere close to 22lbs yet, but if I don't treat him, then he will be the only safe port in the storm for the lice...and I hate to see him crawling with the things.  I dosed him with a 1/2cc on the back of his butt...just a drop.

You are supposed to pour the medicine from neck to tail down the center of the back.  Part the fur and make sure it makes contact with the skin.  It works just like the flea drops you use for your dogs.  I prefer to wear gloves when I do this because inevitably I get some on my skin and, well, I just don't want it on me.  I found that with most of my goats, I can walk right up to them and while I scratch their ears with one hand, I can dose them with the other by running the syringe against the grain of their fur, thus parting it down to the skin.  You don't want to be in the middle of a dosage and have the goat run off so make sure to do it quick.

Again, a suggestion from the goat guru, I will be treating my herd three times, not twice.  I will make sure that the distance between doses is no more than 14 days, because that's when the lice hatch.  Doing it three times will make sure to catch anyone that didn't die in the first two rounds.  Wish me luck!

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Premature Babies and Goat Lice

We've decided that not only was the pot of coffee premature, so were Lilo's babies.  After examining the dead buckling, I can see that his front teeth are not out of the gums yet, a sign of prematurity in goats.  It also makes sense that the premature delivery was caused by a stress of some sort and that's where the meconium came from.

My best friend, and goat guru, Sarah came by this weekend and checked all the goats.  She believes Sox is not pregnant - something I was hoping for as she's a bit small.  We checked Stitch, Asha, and Tumbleweed and felt babies move with all three.  But their ligaments are not loose yet so we have a way to go.  I think they may all be a few weeks to a month out.  Lilo was due around now, so her babies were only about a week early.  Looks like the rest of the girls waited for the next heat cycle to get pregnant.

Another, less pleasant, discovery...my herd is infested with lice.  The first indicator is that some of the girls have rough/curly hair.  This is a symptom that something is wrong.  When you part the fur, you see lots of little pink dots all over.  Those are lice.  I actually had checked the girls last week but missed it because I didn't see any lice MOVING.  Not necessary.  If you see a bunch of pinhead sized pink specks throughout your goat's fur and she seems to be itchier than normal...it's lice.

This is not the same kind of lice that live on people.  Even if my boys go out and rub their heads all over the goats, these lice will not make them a home.  But it needs to be addressed.  I will be going to the feed store this week and getting pyrethrin powder or liquid and treating everyone.  Yuck.  It still makes my skin crawl to think about these little buggers all over my girls.