Why Are My Goats Dying?

With such a wet year, some breeders have been calling us and asking about goat health. People are asking about different symptoms. Here's the 3 major things that we have been hearing about:

1) Parasites:
Goats will have white eyelids, rough coat, and act tired. Goats will carry a heavier parasite load during hot and wet times. Parasites cannot travel very far without being ingested by an animal. I recommend moving or rotating to a new pasture about every 20 days. This works best in groups of 3 evenly sized pastures and at 20 days or less. The parasite cycle is 21 days, so if goats are moved every 20 they will be eating on taller browse that doesn't have any freshly hatched parasites on the ground.

Also supplement with an cottonseed meal or any other type of oily seed that is ground into a meal. Coating the goats' intestines in oil will kill a lot of parasites inside the host. Try not to deworm on a schedule, as this usually promotes parasite resistance to dewormers. Take a plastic bag, flip it inside out and pick up some fresh fecal matter. Your vet will examine these for about $8-$10 and can tell you when it's time to deworm. When you deworm, go heavy. Cydectin, Valblazin, and Ivermectin are what we use, but we do 2.5 times the cattle dosage, and we give it orally.

2) Coccidia:
Usually occurs in young goats under 10 months old. Stunted growth, pot belly, and rough coat are symptoms. This is caused by poor hygiene and contaminated feed/water. Coccidia will stunt your kids at about 30 pounds, and eventually kill them. It's hard to pull them out of this, but easy to prevent. Clean water troughs every 2 weeks. If you have slop holes in your pens, shut them off to the goats. Treat water with Corid every 3 months. Just follow the dosage on the bottle and make this the only water source for the next 7 days. This will give you heavier kids at weaning and less death loss.

3) Mineral deficiency:
A wide range of issues are out there. Selenium deficiency is common east of the Mississippi. A 2cc shot of Bo-Se will act as an annual booster. Loose minerals are available. It looks like play sand, except it's maroon or purplish. Leave this out free choice. Also keep protein levels at 13%-14% for an overall healthier herd. You can do this with protein tubs as well as good forage like alfalfa.

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