Does anyone know of a website or other way I can find out where these workshops are? I searched google and found stuff from 2004 but nothing for 2010-2011...
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I use it with my NDs, and it works great. It usually correlates well with body condition scores and worm counts, although not always. Any chance you have a lot of white goats? Their pigment appears to be lighter. Also, you really do need to do it in good light, preferably sunlight, or they appear lighter. I've scared myself a few times looking at eyelids in the barn. And you have to make sure you pull the eyelid down far enough. Again, I've scared myself a few times by not pulling it down far enough and thinking it was white when it wasn't. The edge of their eyelid is lighter than the inside, especially on white goats.
The training also goes into a lot more than just checking the eyelid color. They talk about dewormers, dosages, body condition, and "smart drenching" protocol, which will slow down the emergence of parasite resistance on your farm. It also talks about the best use for fecals -- which is to check for dewormer resistance. Do a fecal; deworm; do a second fecal a week later to see if there is a reduction. A reduction of less than 85% means you have a resistance problem.
Multiple vets have told me that fecal counts are unreliable, because parasites are not always shedding eggs, so you essentially get a lot of false negative results with fecals. They can confirm the presence of worms, but they can't confirm the absence of worms. I had a buck that was dieing five years ago, and his fecal was fine. I do my own fecals, and I couldn't believe that there was nothing in it, so I took a sample to the local vet, who also found nothing. I took him to U of I vet school, thinking he had some horrible wasting disease. But it was only parasites, which had made him terribly anemic, and we did manage to save him. If I had known about FAMACHA back then, he would never have gotten so sick, because I would have known he was anemic, which is the most important thing anyway. The mere presence of worms does not kill the goats; they die from anemia. If a goat had a high worm count, but was not underweight and scoring well on FAMACHA, then don't deworm -- you've got an animal that is highly resistant to parasite infestation. If a goat has a low worm count on the fecal slide, but is anemic, then deworming would be a good course of treatment, because there aren't that many reasons a goat would be anemic, although you should always check for lice.
I almost lost a dry yearling last month because her body condition was okay, but when she went off feed and got lethargic, I checked her eyelid, and it was white as paper. For about three days, I thought she was going to die, but within a week of starting treatment, her eyelid was light pink, and now it's bright red.
FAMACHA works well for me because I can check my milkers weekly when they're on the milkstand. (I have a white milking parlor with good lighting.) When I notice eyelids getting borderline, I can use things like copper oxide or wormwood or DE, rather than waiting for their condition to deteriorate to the point that they're noticeably sick, and then I have to use chemicals. We had three bucks die from parasites six years ago, and that's when we stared doing our own fecals. After consulting with a U of I vet, the plan was to do fecals monthly on every goat, and that got old really fast -- mostly because we didn't find anything on most slides, which is normal, so it felt like a waste of time. Checking eyelids takes a couple seconds.
Using FAMACHA on my Shetland sheep has also worked well. I haven't used a chemical dewormer on them in two years, except for two seven-year-old ewes, and no one has died, so it's obviously giving me a good picture of their health also.
I took the FAMANCHA training and in my opinion it didn't work very well with our Nigerians. We also have a commercial herd of boers and kiko meat goats. When we did the eyelid FAMACHA testing it looked like my Nigies should all be dead their scores were so bad, (even kids who haven't even been grazing yet), however their worm count was in fact very low. It was created for boers in South Africa and it does work okay for them, however in my opinion Nigies eye lid color is lighter to begin with. Weight and coat condition and/or fecal egg count works better.
If you are close by and in need of this workshop I posted this here for your benefit...
I checked out the website and e-mailed the vet listed in Louisiana. He said that there is one scheduled for August 28th in Covington La. He said he would let me know if it changed.
This website http://wormcontrol.org/
has a lot of info on FAMACHA and "Smart Drenching." I'm not sure if there is a training schedule, but this will give you a good start on learning about it.
Replies
The training also goes into a lot more than just checking the eyelid color. They talk about dewormers, dosages, body condition, and "smart drenching" protocol, which will slow down the emergence of parasite resistance on your farm. It also talks about the best use for fecals -- which is to check for dewormer resistance. Do a fecal; deworm; do a second fecal a week later to see if there is a reduction. A reduction of less than 85% means you have a resistance problem.
Multiple vets have told me that fecal counts are unreliable, because parasites are not always shedding eggs, so you essentially get a lot of false negative results with fecals. They can confirm the presence of worms, but they can't confirm the absence of worms. I had a buck that was dieing five years ago, and his fecal was fine. I do my own fecals, and I couldn't believe that there was nothing in it, so I took a sample to the local vet, who also found nothing. I took him to U of I vet school, thinking he had some horrible wasting disease. But it was only parasites, which had made him terribly anemic, and we did manage to save him. If I had known about FAMACHA back then, he would never have gotten so sick, because I would have known he was anemic, which is the most important thing anyway. The mere presence of worms does not kill the goats; they die from anemia. If a goat had a high worm count, but was not underweight and scoring well on FAMACHA, then don't deworm -- you've got an animal that is highly resistant to parasite infestation. If a goat has a low worm count on the fecal slide, but is anemic, then deworming would be a good course of treatment, because there aren't that many reasons a goat would be anemic, although you should always check for lice.
I almost lost a dry yearling last month because her body condition was okay, but when she went off feed and got lethargic, I checked her eyelid, and it was white as paper. For about three days, I thought she was going to die, but within a week of starting treatment, her eyelid was light pink, and now it's bright red.
FAMACHA works well for me because I can check my milkers weekly when they're on the milkstand. (I have a white milking parlor with good lighting.) When I notice eyelids getting borderline, I can use things like copper oxide or wormwood or DE, rather than waiting for their condition to deteriorate to the point that they're noticeably sick, and then I have to use chemicals. We had three bucks die from parasites six years ago, and that's when we stared doing our own fecals. After consulting with a U of I vet, the plan was to do fecals monthly on every goat, and that got old really fast -- mostly because we didn't find anything on most slides, which is normal, so it felt like a waste of time. Checking eyelids takes a couple seconds.
Using FAMACHA on my Shetland sheep has also worked well. I haven't used a chemical dewormer on them in two years, except for two seven-year-old ewes, and no one has died, so it's obviously giving me a good picture of their health also.
I checked out the website and e-mailed the vet listed in Louisiana. He said that there is one scheduled for August 28th in Covington La. He said he would let me know if it changed.
http://wormcontrol.org/
has a lot of info on FAMACHA and "Smart Drenching." I'm not sure if there is a training schedule, but this will give you a good start on learning about it.
Deborah