Coughing goats

Hi guys-

I recently added two goats to my herd.  One was a doe that I bought locally .  When I got her home she had a dry cough, very mild, very occasional.  I was giving her some herbal preparations, one for immune support the other deworming.  She also got a copper bolus.  She doesn't show any other signs of parasites, her color is good, weight is good.  The move did not seem to stress her out one bit.  She literally got out of my car and was like "hmm.  shrug.  okay"  After the week of herbs the cough seemed to go away, thought we were good.

 

Then I bring in a buckling who I shipped from out of state.  He arrived with a snot nose, by day 2 he also had a juicy, nasty cough.  I emailed the breeder about it and she said to go get Duramycin at the store and give him a shot.  I did that, and voila, no more snot and not another cough from that moment on.

 

I think everyone is fine for a week and a half and now suddenly Penny is coughing, but it is not the juicy one the baby had, just a dry cough.  Next thing I know, Violet (the new doe) is coughing again too, dry cough.  They are totally bright eyed and bushy tailed otherwise.

 

So...did I bring in a bug?  Or do they have lungworm?  Antibiotics, dewormer, or what?  They are all milking and I don't want to throw out milk unless I have to.  Also don't want to give a dewormer unless I have to for resistance reasons.  How can I tell what the problem is and how to treat it?  

 

 

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Replies

  • Oh I've sure spent a couple of nights combing the fields with a flash light looking for the hen who didn't make it home by dark.  Proud to say that I have found & saved two out of three.

     

     

  • lol! I know me too. I have even run out in it after an old hen gone nite nite out in the open with Hubby on the porch screaming something about someone losing their mind! Not sure what he meant. lol!

  • The only other piece of evidence I have is that maybe five months ago, Miyagi had this same cough.  Persistent, dry cough and no other symptoms.  I decided to deworm him because it had been maybe a year and a half since he had had a dewormer so I felt like no harm in just going ahead and doing it.  His cough cleared up within two days of the Ivomec.

     

    But Penny just had Ivomec 4 months ago when she kidded so I am loathe to just give it to her again now, especially since otherwise she looks great- color is excellent, coat is sleek and shiny, weight is good.

     

    The new doe, who also has the cough but is coughing a lot less than Penny, has a pretty rough coat, color is not AS good but not so bad I would give her a chemical dewormer.  Her coat has definitely improved since I have had her.  Her weight is good.

     

    I did start Penny on the herbs on Monday when I first heard her cough.   I kind of said to myself I would wait until Friday, when the herbs are done, and see what happens.  they certainly don't appear to be really sick. 

     

    The new doe just finished another round of herbs (I bought better ones and did her over)

     

    Believe it or not our weather has actually been pretty good.  My one big problem is that my herd has outgrown my rain shed and I have them split up in all sorts of strange ways because I have this new buckling who I thought could go right in with the big bucks since he was 4 months old already, but he arrived looking like a 2 month old and he cannot stand up to the big boys.  So I have the buckling pastured with the two does I want him to breed anyway, and the rest of the does in another pasture with the 3.5 month old doeling I retained this year (oh yeah, it's a laugh a minute around here)

     

    Consequently, they have all gotten rained on a few times despite my efforts to run down and rescue them every time.   Mind you, rained on on a 90 degree day.  But still.  They tell me it was the most horrific experience of their little goatie lives.  And much to my husband's dismay, I did risk my life in a lightning storm yesterday to race down there and let them into the barn....sigh.

  • Since neither one seems sick, maybe just use the herbs that you used last time?

  • Juliana, I wish I knew for sure what to tell you and I don't but I do want to at least offer you some encouragement. I hope everything will be good soon.

    Do you think that it may just be all this crazy weather? I realize that you can't just sit back and hope that is what it is but if you do all you know to do without it going away then maybe that is all it is! Hopefully it will be that simple and nothing serious. Last year when those 9 does came in, one of them arrived with a cough which actually got really bad at times. I was sure that poor Popcorn probably had lung worms. I did all kinds of things for any reason I could think of that she might have it. It just seemed that it would never go away. I finally got so use to it that I didn't even realize it, and all of a sudden it hit me that she was no longer doing it! She coughed off and on, better and worse for probably several months. But then when it hit me that it was gone, that was it. She still does not cough at all! Very weird.

    Hopefully someone can give you some tips soon. But meanwhile, Hang in there!

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