Castrating and Lice

Treated everyone for sucking and biting lice with permethrin 10 - 1.5cc for adults, .75cc for kids.  We also castrated all of the boys.  They were pretty late (2 months +) but we were able to use the traditional emasculator and green cheerios.  Glad those things are done.

Bottle Feeding Schedule

Here is the schedule that Fiasco Farms uses.
Use the chart above for info on offering hay, grain, etc.

• Day one- 6 oz. (per feeding) colostrum, every 4 hours.
• Day two- 8 oz. (per feeding) colostrum/whole milk, 4 times a day
• Day three- 10 oz. (per feeding) colostrum/whole milk, 4 times a day
• Day four- 10-12 oz. (per feeding) colostrum/whole milk, 4 times a day.
• For the next week- 10-12 oz. (per feeding) 4 times a day.
• For the next 2 months- 10-12 oz. (per feeding) 3 times a day.
• For the next 1 month- 10-12 oz. (per feeding) 2 times a day.
• 10-12 oz. (per feeding) once a day for two weeks.

Goose Poop

Did you know that a single goose can poop up to three pounds a day?  They can.  And mine have chosen to poop on the back deck.  So three pounds times six geese means eighteen pounds of poop on my deck every day.  It's just too much.

Due to their overactive pooping, I have decided to reduce the number of geese I have.  The guy I got them from is willing to take them back (since I never paid him anyway).  He's also going to take two of the three babies.  He's going to butcher them - which is what I would do if I had a plucker.  I'm keeping Violet the Toulouse goose and one of her babies - hopefully a female.  That will bring the poop level down to six pounds a day which still sounds like too much.  I may have to get rid of all of them.

UPDATE:  I decided to get rid of all six geese.  My friend promised he'd find Violet a nice home.

Advice on Sick Goats

Years ago Sue Rieth, BI, lady with immeasurable goat knowledge told me to treat these colds with selenium injections, the vitamin B carrier was an important part of it she gave like 3 injections a week for the first week and then it I don't know it was a lot I know you can overdose selenium you might try the vitamin B complex way more than you think necessary but she did it for like a month maybe daily the first week if you just have vitamin B three times a week the next week and then weekly for 3 more weeks or something like that.

***

Before Fair:  Not sure what all of your goats caught, but if it was a respiratory thing what I treat with prior to bringing any of my goats to a show is Inforce 3.

***

It won't help you now, however, we have found that coccidiosis quite often turns into an enterotoxemia problem in an older goat. Any time we have an older goat kid or an adult start to scour and we find that they have a high cocci fecal count, we treat the cocci with Toltrazuril, Biosponge, and Gentamyacin (antibiotic - oral) and then also give a shot of CD&T anti-toxin (NOT the toxiod) for possible entertoxemia if it does't resolve with the cocci treatment.

Goodbye Lilo

I had to make the decision today.  I went to the barn and Lilo couldn't get up.  She made a grunting welcome sound, tried to rise, and then fell back.  I told her it was ok...she didn't need to get up on my account.  I went back into the house and got a pan full of warm molasses water and a blanket.

She drank the water greedily and stopped shivvering as I placed the down covers over her back.  But she was couching and grinding her teeth, her eyes closed to the world around her.  She moved her head toward my chest and rested it there.

I sat for a long time just rubbing her cheeks.  She let her head sag and she leaned into me some more.  I told her it was ok.  I understood.

I got up and called the only person I could think of - our butcher.  Joe told me that he'd be there as soon as possible.  I spent the next hour crying, talking to friends, and wandering the property.  I eventually ended up back with Lilo.  She was the same as when I had left her.  She sat with her eyes closed, her nose full of snot, her teeth grinding, and her body shaking.  I could see that she had been having diarrhea but was too weak to get up when she went.

I went out to the gate to meet Joe.  He came back to the barn the way he always has, with his short 22 in his hand and a purpose in his step.  We opened the barn door to find Lilo a few feet from where I left her.

He walked up to her and asked if she were the one.  I said yes and began to explain.  I had just enough time to cover my ears when the shot went through her head.  She slipped further down the wall and shook.  I shook with her.  I have seen many animals go through this process.  We have always told the boys that the shakes and twitches are the energy leaving the animal's body.  But thinking about it now, Lilo's spirit left her the minute that bullet hit her head.  The twitches were nothing but a body.

And that's how Joe treated it.  Now, I am not faulting him.  I called him because I knew that he could do something that I couldn't do.  He could shoot her and deal with her body in a way that I couldn't.  But I wasn't prepared to watch him drag her out of the barn, her head trailing behind, and then curl her up into a blue barrel.  She looked so small in the bottom of that barrel.  And as I closed the gate behind the truck, I whispered "Goodbye Lilo."

Very Sick Goat

Lilo is looking worse today than yesterday.  She has extreme diarrhea to the point that her tail and legs are covered in it.  She is still eating, but that's about the only positive thing I can say about her condition.

I don't know at what point you decide that a goat is suffering too much to save.  We are only on day two of CoRid, but I don't know if that will be enough for her to bounce back from this.  And as much as I love her, if she isn't healthy, she isn't useful in the herd.  At this point, I'm not sure that I will ever breed her or Asha again.  So then what do I do with them?

J says to butcher.  That's what a lot of farmers do with their older livestock.  It is another way to keep things from going to waste.  If we just euthanize her, it does nobody any good.  But I don't think I could eat Lilo even if I wanted to.  And at this point, giving her CoRid means that she cannot be butchered for at least 24 hours.

So do I call the vet and have her put down?  Do I call the butcher and see if he would be willing to put her down for a kill fee?  Do I have the neighbor come over and do it?  Or do I wait, hoping that she will get better; hoping that she will not infect everyone else; hoping that she isn't suffering?

CD&T Dosage

2ml per goat.

Sick Lilo

Lilo hasn't really been great ever since the green bloat.  She continued to cough on occasion and just didn't look like she felt very good.  But in the last week, she has gone downhill fast.

She is very thin, her fur is coarse and curly, and she has clumpy poop.  Z said he saw her fall down yesterday.  Asha has the same symptoms only not quite as bad.

We started a round of CoRid to treat cocci.  My first thought is that is what is persisting underneath anything else.  Lilo certainly caught a cold from the girls who came back from fair, but I don't want to shock her system.  24cc of CoRid for all the adult does.  I'm not concerned about Fool's Gold, he looks perfectly healthy.

One reason I think we may be fighting cocci is the feeding situation.  The goat feeder has lost a board and the girls continually pull the hay out onto the ground.  In addition, the chickens have decided that the goat feeder is a good roost at night.  There is always poop in the bottom of the feeder.  Chickens have cocci too so I'm wondering if they are contaminating the hay as well.

I am going to follow through with five days of CoRid to see if we can get these girls feeling better.  After that, I'm going to worm everyone and then update their CD & T.  I know I've been lax with their vaccinations.  I've felt like since we've kept a closed herd for the most part, that we didn't need to vaccinate.  I'm thinking maybe that is a mistake.  We will do Covexin 8 soon and then follow up with a booster in six weeks.

Hopefully everyone will be feeling better soon.  I would like to breed the girls now, but I'm not going to be able to do that until everyone is feeling better.  For now, I will only breed Buttercup, Tumbleweed, and Anna.

Recap of the Last Year

Ok.  So I've been completely lax in writing on the blog.  My goal is to be more current with this blog as it is a great help to me when I'm looking back on things.

Here's what happened over the last year.  In September 2015, we found a place to move into that had enough room for everyone.  It is five acres, with a barn and a shop.  The goats are loving it, the chickens don't have a coop right now, but we're working on it.  And the dogs love having all the space to run around.  The entire property is fenced so we can actually let them run.

All of my does kidded early in 2016.  Anna was the first on January 1st.  She had twins and they both were very healthy - Elsa and Olaf.

Tumbleweed kidded on January 22nd with triplets - Juniper, Tulip and baby 3.  They were all completely formed, but we lost one of them in the birth.  I think Tumbles was so busy with the first two that she didn't get to the third on in time to clear the amniotic sac from her nose.  Two weeks later, we lost another one of her babies when it jumped into the horse trough and drowned.  I have never had that problem before but we will be filling all of the troughs with cinder blocks from now on.

Lilo kidded on Valentine's Day.  She had twins - Bow and Arrow.  They were small but well formed.

Asha was the last to kid.  She was bred by Fool's Gold - our Boer buck.  She had a single - Fin.  I'm not sure exactly what the date was as I didn't write it down in my calendar, but it was the end of February.  Fin was the first cross bred kid...very big and beautiful.

All the babies grew well.  Kobi chose Juniper as his market goat, but he got cocci and was down for a bit.  It stunted his growth and Kobi chose to work with Elsa instead.  Marli chose to work with Fin and Zayne chose to work with Olaf.

Mid-spring, we sold Bow and Arrow to a gentleman for butcher.  It was a stretch to get them up to 60 lbs.  We started using a creep feeder with all of the babies, keeping it full all the time.

Beginning of summer, we sold Freestyle - our Alpine buck.  We decided that having an Alpine didn't fit with our overall herd plan.  We really have been focusing more on meat babies and Freestyle didn't help with that at all.  I sold him for a song.

We prepared for fair, fighting to get everyone up to weight.  We fed Dairy 16 and alfalfa pellets free choice to all of the babies, but they just didn't grow as well as we wanted.  In the end, Kobi's goat came in at 72lbs - 3lbs shy for auction weight...again.  Marli's goat came in largest at 90 and Zayne came in at 81.  Both boys did very well in auction - fetching $5 and $5.50 per pound respectively.

Oh..we had a strange problem with frothy green bloat.  The goats were out of their pen for the night and the next day both Asha and Lilo were sick.  J said they were throwing up, but we all know that goats cannot throw up.  They were actually slinging their cud, which looks a lot like throwing up.  Two days of frothy green mouths and very unhappy girls.  They would cough up their cud and throw their heads around, flinging the green cud everywhere.  We gave them vegetable oil to help break up the gas in their rumens.  It seemed to help but it was slow.  Afterward, Lilo continued to cough every once in awhile.

I put in a vegetable garden but it wasn't very productive.  There was a lot of grass in the yard and I didn't keep up with weeding.  The ground was deplete of any nutrients and nothing but the potatoes grew very well.  I plan on covering everything with black plastic this winter and see if we can kill the weeds.  Either that or bring in raised beds.  The only thing I don't like about the idea of raised beds is not being able to till.  But I suppose if I have great soil, I can just plant overwinter crops and then remove them in the spring when I'm ready to plant.  I got more from the 3ft by 12ft garden I had that was done as a square foot garden than I did out of this 24 ft by 24 ft garden.

We lost our bunny - Captain America - to heat stroke this summer.  We had given Black Bear to a friend for her daughter.  M wasn't spending as much time with them and we thought it might be time to get rid of the rabbits altogether.  I think that there might have been some lack of care that went into his death, but nonetheless, M was crushed.

And last but not least, after fair we came home with a new goat to add to the herd - even though we have been downsizing the herd.  J is in Guam so he didn't have anything to say about it.  Her name is Buttercup.  She is two or three years old and a purebred Boer.  She does have horns which was my only concern.  But she is proven and we hope that she will give us some great babies for fair next year.  We put her in to the pen with Fool's Gold today to start the breeding process.  We are waiting with the other girls - next post will explain.

Anna's First Kidding

Well, it must be that time...Anna decided to kid last night.  This is her first freshening so we were a little more apprehensive about how she would do, but she did great!

A few weeks ago, when I was trimming everyone's hooves, I felt her for babies and thought I felt something.  But then she wasn't very big and didn't seem to be getting that baby belly.  We thought she might not have taken this time.  Then as the other girls started getting udders, Anna started to fill up too.  We thought she was so petite, maybe she was just getting a "sympathetic udder" - when there's so much estrogen in the air that all the girls get an udder regardless of breeding status.  But we were wrong.

Last night, in the pouring down rain on the Sunday night after J had two weeks off at home, Anna decided to deliver.  She had one baby and our dear friends called to tell us.  The boys jumped in the car and headed over to see.  While our friends were helping Anna over to the kidding side of the barn (we really weren't thinking she was ready to kid yet), she delivered her second.  Both babies are strong, healthy doelings - a white one and a strawberry one.  One baby weighed in at 8lbs 12oz and the other weighed in at 8lbs 8oz.  Those are some great weights for first time babies and she certainly hid them well in her frame!

Looks like both babies are from Fool's Gold, our Boer buck.  One of the babies seems to have a very flexible hind leg, but my guess is that she's just a rubber band baby and will solidify over the next few days.  I am thrilled to see Anna doing so well.  J said that she was letting the babies latch, albiet uncomfortably.  Her udder is beautiful, round and well-attached with two straight teats.  We'll see what she thinks of milking in a few weeks.

Another note - we gave Tumbleweed's doeling .2cc BoSe subQ last night.  Her front legs seem to be getting stronger.  I will be taking our boys over after school today to give the bucklings their shots - with these two being 4-H goats, the boys need to take care of all of their shots.  M isn't sure that he can do it - says he doesn't like crying babies - but I'm sure he can help.

Tumbleweed Has Triplets

We've been waiting to see when the does will start kidding this year.  I was a little off as I expected kidding to start almost a month ago.  From the look of things, we guessed there were triplets in store for Tumbleweed.  We were right.

Let me back up a little.  Our farm is disjointed again.  We had to find temporary housing for all of the goats and chickens while we search for a house to buy.  The rental that we are in only allows for the two dogs, and that was lucky.  So, thanks to our wonderful friends, the does are all at one house (a seasoned goat 4-H family) and the chickens and bucks are at another house.

We got the call last night that Tumbleweed had kidded while everyone was at Target.  I had warned them that she would wait until she was alone to kid.  But that's what you want when you look at a breeding doe - one that handles the whole kidding thing all by herself.  It's always a little disappointing to wait for the birth and then miss it, though.

We hurried over (just five minutes away) and were there to watch everyone get cleaned up and nursing.  There were two bucklings and a doeling - all different colors - kind of a surprise when you look at their mom and dad.  The first buckling, K's fair goat, weighed 7lbs 13oz and was brown and white spotted.

Kobi decided pretty quickly that this little boy would be named Sagebrush - an homage to his mother's high desert roots.

The second born was the doeling, Z's for now - although she may be a meat goat, She weighed 6lbs 10oz and was almost all brown with white socks, a white star on her forehead, a white spot on her belly, and a white tip on her tail.

Our friend suggested "Little Red" but we're not sure as we have a very strong chicken personality named Red.  We've learned today that this little girl is having a hard time with her front legs.  She was probably curled up pretty tight inside momma.  We are going to give her BoSe and work on some muscle stretches and massages.  If any of them have to be a bottle baby, she would be the one we'd choose - not only because of her legs, but also because we don't want the boys raising their market goats as bottle babies.  It would be pretty hard to give them up after raising them like that.

The last born was the biggest buckling, weighing a whopping 8lbs 13oz and completely different than his siblings in color.  He is mostly white with black/grey mottled ears and muzzle.  A very lanky young buckling, he looks like his legs outgrew his body.

Marli will be showing this beautiful boy at fair this year.  He doesn't have a name yet, but we'll find something that fits.

All in all, the babies look fabulous.  There were some folded ears that we cannot correct - they look like they've been folded for awhile in utero.  And we will need to watch baby B's front legs.  But everyone was up and nursing within the first 30 minutes which is fantastic!

I have never had a doe raise triplets on her own so we will also be closely monitoring the babies and their health.  I would love to Tumbles to raise all three, but I want to be ready if we need to supplement for these little ones.

Triplets A, B, and C in birth order from left to right.

My next doe to kid...I'm thinking Lilo with twins.

Dosage for CoRid

Recommended dose: " Amprolium 50 mg/kg body weight per head per day for 5 days.(*NOTE: This dose is five times the recommended calf dose.)"-Pugh 

Calf dose:90cc Corid-16 oz(or 480cc) of water give at a rate of 30cc/100# btw. NOT STRONG ENOUGH!! 

Here are the drugs recommended for coccidiostats used for treatment and prevention of coccidiosis in small ruminants. 

Lasalocid-20 to 30 g per ton-approved for use in sheep in US 
Decoquinate-0.5 mg/kg per head per day-approved goats 
Monensin 10-30 gram/ton of feed-approved goats, may be most effective choice for goats. 
Amprolium (Corid)-50mg/kg.. 
Sulfaquinoxaline 13 mg/kg bwt per head per day as solution in water-3-5 day-approved 
Sulfamethazine 119 to 238 mg/kg per head/day 50 g/ton in feed...not approved 
Salinomycin 382 g/ton feed-not approved 

If you are going to use the corid, use it at the following rates and syringe it into each kid according to weight. 
Don't use water treatement the kids will not drink enough of the water. 

Treatment dose....use once a day for 5 days..no less.Use it full strength...no water! The "calf dose" isn't strong enough for goats. 

Doses below are 50mg/kg (2.2#)....recommended treatment levels for caprines. 

6cc/25# 
12cc/50# 
18cc/75 
24cc/100#

Safeguard for Goats

We treated all of the goats for worms today.  We used SafeGuard (fenbendazole) for horses.  The dosage for goats is 4 times the horse dose.  So when we dosed Asha, we calculated her weight at 150 pounds, multiplied by 4, and dosed her for 600 pounds.  She was not interested in helping, but holding her in the stanchion made it nearly impossible for her to object.

Covexin 8 for Baby Alpines

K gave Freestyle and Romeo their first Covexin 8 shots today.  He did a fantastic job, drawing up the meds, injecting, drawing back for flash, and administering the meds.  We gave each buckling 2ccs.  We did not do this with the meat bucklings because we prefer to keep all meds out of our meat unless necessary.

Disbudded Babies

We disbudded the Alpine bucklings today.  They are nine days old today and boy am I glad we didn't wait.  Romeo's horn buds were quite large.  We used the disbudder, counting for five seconds and then another five seconds to get a beautiful copper ring.  Freestyle's rings did not look quite as copper as I would like, but I am not comfortable going beyond ten seconds of burning.  Hopefully, with their age and the previous successes we've had disbudding, we will have horn-free goats.

Escape Goats

We knew from experience that a four foot fence was laughable.  We knew that it was only going to buy us a little bit of time.  And we were reminded again.  All of my roses are eaten.

Because we are a little short on cash, we needed to figure out how to keep the girls from jumping the fence anytime they want to until we can buy hot wire.  This was the first attempt.

It was successful - for about a day.  We will be getting hot wire tomorrow.

Asha Delivers Twins

This morning while we were graining the goats, M mentioned to me that Asha had a "balloon coming out of her butt."  I told him that this meant she was going to have the babies today.  He and Z were both still home, so we decided to keep them home to watch the delivery.  I ran in the house to get dressed (doesn't everyone do their chores in pjs?)  While inside, M yelled to me that the balloon had popped!

Asha has kidded before and done it without complication so I knew that she would be fine.  She walked, pawed the ground, lay down, got up, and walked some more.  Two little black and white hooves began to poke out of her rear end.  Each time she would lie down, the baby hooves would come out further.  Each time she would stand up, the baby hooves would suck back inside.  I wanted so badly to just reach over and tug...but I had to trust the momma.  She knew what to do.

Here's our goat delivering twin A.

The boys and I watched for what seemed like forever, but was actually about a half an hour.  Finally, we saw a head and with a few hard pushes, the baby was born.  Asha went right to work cleaning her baby up.  She made sure that he was breathing and stimulated, just like she should.  There was no need for us to intervene.  She made sure that the amniotic sac was gone and that he would begin to dry soon in the morning sun.

Soon, the second "balloon" appeared.  It popped almost immediately.  Asha alternated between standing, lying, pushing, and cleaning.  Soon the first baby was up on his wobbly legs.  He walked right behind Asha as she began to deliver the second baby's head.  As she delivered him, she paused - his hind quarters still inside her, but his front already out and starting to breath and move.  She seemed a bit confused, stood up quickly and turned.  Baby B came slipping out quickly.

Within fifteen minutes, both babies were cleaned up and drying.  Asha is a little protective and it was hard to get close enough to check to see if these were boys or girls.  But after several failed attempts, we determined that we have two beautiful, albiet unmilkable, Apline bucklings.  They look just like their daddy.

Here's a photo of the two boys a few days old on their first romp.  Introducing Rogers' Roost Romeo in the foreground, and Rogers' Roost Freestyle in the back.

Show Ducks?

I'm a sucker for ducks.  So when this gal was looking for 4-H kids who would like to have some show ducks, I responded.  I figured that they would want more money than I was willing to shell out.  But no...they were free.

Z and I went to select the three ducklings that we were going to bring home for him.  There were several varieties of Runner - white, pencil, black, fawn & white.  It was hard to choose.  So we came home with four.  I think it was either the ducklings or the two extra turkens that K brought home for me that put hubby over the edge.  He came up to my room and quietly asked me what keel-hauling was.  I've been married to a sailor long enough to know this one, so I batted my eyelashes and coyly agreed to a moratorium on all things poultry.

Here is a picture of our four Runner ducklings - Pencil, Chalk, Sharpie, and Crayola.

I mean really, who could say no to those faces?

Lucky for hubby, possession date for 4-H is today.  So...we won't be adding any more livestock - until the meat chickens arrive in June.

Our Family is Whole Again

This weekend we brought home the goats.  It was fantastic.  We didn't have the palace set up as much as we'd like, but it is something we can continue to work on as we go.  And now we'll have help.  Goat help.

We went to our friend's house to pick up the goats in the Expedition.  Now, we have been struggling with hoof rot, hoof scald, and lice at their house.  Because we didn't have a trailer to quarantine the goats in for a few days (and hubby refused to let them stay in the car that long), we had to do our best to treat as we moved them.

To this end, we cleaned and treated their hooves as we loaded them into the car.  We treated their hooves again when we got to the house.  And we treated for lice the minute they were out of the car.  Permethrin really stinks so I didn't want it in the car.

Here is the video of the goaties unloading to their new home.

By the way, we tried a new procedure for delousing this time.  Because I usually use Eprinex Pour-On, I had to do some searching to find the correct dosage for Permethrin - what I had bought at the store, thinking that is what I always use.  I mixed Permethrin 10% at a 1:2 ratio with vegetable oil.  That brought the percentage down to 2.5%.  I saw several references to 1% and several to 5%.  I figured 2.5% was a good compromise (and an easy ratio to convert).  With a small syringe, I poured no more than 1.5cc's of the mix down the spine of each adult goat, and about .75cc's for each little one.

NOTE:  AFTER TALKING WITH THE VET, WE LEARNED THAT USING PERMETHRIN AT FULL STRENGTH IS JUST FINE FOR GOATS.

Show Chickens

We are now the proud owners of show chickens.  We've had them for about two weeks now and while some of the chicks are easy to tell which breed they are, others are still a mystery.  We got the chicks through Urch Hatchery - as a favor to our poultry 4-H project.  It was a great deal.  We ordered 100 chicks.  He sent us 100 chicks at $2 a piece.  He guaranteed that all chicks would be show quality birds, but that was it.  He got to choose the breeds and it was a straight run.

We shared the chicks with all of our poultry project kids and Z kept eight of his favorites.  Here are two that we can tell will be fun birds for fair.  This first one is most likely a Plymouth White Rock Frizzle.  His/her name is currently Mrs. Frizzle.

Our second favorite is a Naked Neck Red.  Her/his name is Ostrich (for obvious reasons).

Oh, it is so much fun to watch them grow into their breeds.  I love my chickens.