One of my 7 week old kids has crusty stuff around her eyes and a little crusty junk in her nose. I have only heard her cough a couple of times, though. It seems like she has a cold. One of my other kids has a lot of eye mucus that runs down one side of her face. I wipe it off and she seems to like to have it wiped off, too. I have had one goat have this before but it looked infected. This doesn't look infected. Because it is cold I am keeping them in the barn and there bedding is hay. Is this a bedding problem? What should I do?
Thank you all for this website. I feel so much safer knowing that it exists.
Jamey
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Hej from Sweden !
Deborah I just found this entry of yours about pneumonia. Our Frida , the one who was breathing strangely did go to the vet and it was pneiúmonia. She was treated with a round of antibiotics, she was getting better then when the round was complete, she took a turn for the worst again struggling to breath. She had been on a broad spectrum antibiotic for the past 10 days. She has been eating well, tending to her daughters and drinking water. We have had her in our "baby yard" where it is just her and her daughters but I know she wanted to be out with the others. Last night after being in the larger enclosure with the rest of the herd, she had a really difficult time breathing. She is fine when she is out, it's the run back to the stable that seems to get her and it takes a couple of hours to calm her breathing down, but it does calm to a regular pattern. I have read about your trial with pneumonia and saw that your little one pulled through. How did that happen? Any suggestions for me?
Should she just be kept calm and away from the hustle of the herd? She is 90% better but that 10% in the evening worries me. She is so happy and really enjoys being out with the entire gang, I just can't keep her in the "baby yard". She seems a bit depressed when she is there.
Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:
Good, then. I will check her eye. Wow, that is great that the buck survived.
Thanks again,
Jamey
Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:
I'd also suggest very carefully looking at the goat with the crusty eye. I had a kid this past summer get a thorn in his eyelid. That caused a lot of drainage! Once I got the thorn out, he was fine.
No, a goat with pneumonia just looks sick and has no appetite. They have a fever in the beginning, but then it starts to plummet and they get hypothermic as they're really close to death. I had a buck with pneumonia six years ago, and my first clue that anything was wrong was that he was just down and wouldn't get up. When I put my ear up to his throat, his breathing was real gravelly. I mentioned him in a post a couple days ago. His body temperature wouldn't even register on my thermometer. I thought the thermometer was broken, so I put it in warm water, and it shot right up. I checked his temp three times, because I couldn't believe it could be so low. To this day, I still can't believe he pulled through.
James Samuel Sturgill said:
Yeah, the hay is a little dusty. After I asked, I actually went and swept out the barn just in case. Right now, where it is cold. I have them in a pin in the barn, and I have shut all but one door so that there is not too much of a draft. I bet that is why it is getting crusty. I am in Southwest Virginia, the Appalachians, definitely not hot. Although probably not Illinois cold.
I was primarily worried about pneumonia since I read where you wrote it is the second leading cause in goat deaths. So, crusty eyes is not a symptom of pneumonia?
Thanks again for your quick, comprehensive, and condensed answers.
Jamey
Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:
Is the hay dusty? The eye problem could be caused by the goat getting poked in the eye with a piece of hay or something like that, and it will probably heal just fine. What part of the country are you in? Is it still hot there? Unless you have flies, an eye infection is unlikely. Ironically, in goats, pink eye causes their entire eyeball to turn bluish-white. It's very creepy looking, and you would not miss it.