# MILKWEED!



## cmjust0

We opened up some new grazing/browsing area to the goats..  Basically, the whole farm.  

We'd had a couple of crappy commercial does back there, while the rest of our goats were on just a couple acres in the barnyard..  Hadn't been a problem in the past, but...well...more goats, more problems.

Anyhow, there's milkweed on them thar hills.  There's also plenty of ironweed, baby trees, big trees with droopy branches, various broadleaf weeds, and it's all filled in with tall fescue.  And it's about 21 acres..  Not a prayer that they're gonna ever get hungry out there, so we didn't really stress over a little milkweed scattered here and there.

So we took the goats on a "tour" last night...walked them all the way to the back, looped around, and came back.  Along the way, I'd see a few nose at some mature milkweed and seem to turn their nose up at it..

Then we went into a little pasture area I bushhogged maybe a month ago and there was young, tender milkweed growing...TASTY milkweed, apparently.  They went berserk, eating milkweed as fast as they could shovel it down.  I personally witnessed one of our adult does snap about an 18" milkweed plant off a few inches above the ground and "woodchipper" it right on down before I could even get to her.

We led them away from it, and when we got back to the barn, I maybe almost halfway thought about considering the possibility of maybe, possibly doing something like perhaps breaking out the charcoal...but...meh.  Figured I'd see what happened first.



Nothing.

Nothing happened.

As of this morning, everybody's perfectly fine, and my understanding is that if they're going to start showing symptoms, it would happen within a few hours of ingestion.

So...what do you guys think?  I never considered milkweed to be like _wilted-cherry-leaf_ dangerous anyway, but I always kinda figured that if one hoovered down an entire milkweed PLANT...probably would get the squirts or sling a cud or _something_..  So, how much milkweed do you reckon it would take before a goat became seriously ill with it?  Does anybody even really know?

I guess I'm just wondering if it has to be a situation where they're starving to death and get turned out onto an old creekbank that's just FULL of milkweed or something like that...

Oh...I've also witnessed, with my own two eyes, our big ol' fat herdqueen percentage Boer hoover up a whole bullthistle plant...aka, _nightshade_.  

Nuthin'.


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## ksalvagno

I guess you can be the test herd and see how much is too much. Then report back to us. 

It really is impossible to get every bad plant out of a pasture. Even if you killed everything and started over, all it would take is the wind blowing some seed onto your pasture and you are back to square one.

I wonder if how poisonous things are depends on things like the time of year (like more poisonous in the spring than late summer) or it isn't as bad or worse when mowed on a regular basis. Who knows.


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## jodief100

After growing up in the desert I am still trying to figure out what plants are what.  If it doesn't have spines I am lost.  Is milkweed the one with little purple flowers that is really tall?

I  go with the as long as they have lots of good stuff they won't eat the bad stuff theory, but I do try to learn more about the really bad ones.


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## Shiloh Acres

Well ... I'm gonna stick my neck out here and admit my stupidity. 

I didn't even know when I got the goats that milkweed, and various other things, were poisonous. It was my understanding that goats would take a bit of this and a bit of that and couldn't really be poisoned on pasture. I DID go to websites looking for local noxious weeds and try to scout the pasture for them. I basically gave up because there is such a variety out there and sometimes you can be looking at a poisonous plant and not recognize it anyway cuz it doesn't happen to look like thier photo or drawing at that stage. 

Now I KNOW ... there's milkweed out there. Ummmm .... Correction, there WAS milkweed out there. There still is, on the fields outside the pasture. But the goats have cleaned it up inside the pasture. They will eat just about anything, except this one fuzzy grayish plant with blue flowers that everyone leaves alone. 

Never had diarrhea. No one ever slung cud. Other than losing weight and body condition, pale eyelids, and a cough once or twice over a few months, not much sign of anything (except the doeling with bottlejaw). Worms are my problem. I see slightly clumpy poo from time to time, but to tell you the truth, except to keep an eye on it, I don't worry anymore. It never lasts more than a day, and I don't "treat" it. 

Maybe I'm being TOO laid-back about it. I do try to keep a close eye on ALL my animals, feed them well, keep them safe and happy. I tend to obsess about signs of illness, but ...

Well, I don't wanna change the subject.   But I have wondered how many noxious weeds my goats might have eaten. And I do worry that I'm being lulled into a false sense of security -- what if those same weeds BECOME toxic in fall? Early spring?

Sigh, I didn't even know about Johnson grass till I read it online. And it IS everywhere on the roadside. I don't think there's any in the pasture, but maybe they keep it too short for me to identify. But short of finding an expert to walk the property with me and point out everything poisonous, I don't even know. And even if I did that, like Karen said, I doubt I could permanently eradicate it.


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## mully

Milkweed is more toxic when it is a young plant.


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## savingdogs

This thread is very interesting to me because I have these same thoughts. We live in a heavily forested area and also have landscaped areas with of course, the wrong plants.

When we were deciding to get goats, I was researching and googling "wild plants and goat" and "Poisonous plant/goats", etc. All I kept getting were people talking about how goats are wonderful to pasture with other animals because horse and cows won't touch the stuff the goats eat and the goats don't really eat much grass. 
I have found this to be true and while the goats did eat the tops of the grass in their area, it is the weeds they relished and there are none left.

I also drive by a burro farm and a goat farm side by side on my way to work. The goat farm has lush, tall grass as far as the eye can see. The burro farm has little grass and lots of weeds. Makes me glad I have goats!

We have let ours free-range with full access to the native Pacific Northwest plants which include many on the "bad" list, with no ill effects. They seem to know. 
However I wondered about their wisdom in this when I saw they had eaten half of an enormous azalea! I also watched to see what would happen afterward. They were fine. Of course we try to keep them out of the landscaped area but they are such little stinkers, they have the whole forest out there and instead want my little patch of flowers out front.
I would love to hear other people's thoughts on this.


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## Shiloh Acres

Hmmm ... I love azaleas. I haven't done any real landscaping yet but I had figured I "couldn't have" azaleas and such. In case the goats got out and took a tiny bite and fell over dead. 

I will probably avoid azaleas and known poisonous plants anyway. Still ... A few years ago I wanted to get a few Pygmy goats but was told they'd die if they got to the azaleas. It was a rented house, so I couldn't remove the plants, so I passed on the goats.


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## cmjust0

jodief100 said:
			
		

> After growing up in the desert I am still trying to figure out what plants are what.  If it doesn't have spines I am lost.  Is milkweed the one with little purple flowers that is really tall?


Common milkweed has a pinkish-purple cluster of flowers at the top, though there's one fairly common to pastures that has an orange-red cluster of flowers.  You might hear it called "butterfly weed."  

It's just an orange milkweed, though..  :/

Here's common milkweed:






Here's "butterfly weed":






Seeing as how you're also in Kentucky, I'm gonna say there's about a 98.4% chance that you're talking about ironweed.  Ironweed is tall with sparse, deep-purple flowers this time of year.  

Here's ironweed:





I was gonna post one of bullthistle/nightshade, but apparently what "folks 'round here" call bullthistle isn't what google images calls bullthistle...and when I google "nightshade," well, that's not it either.



I'll try to figure out what it is I'm talking about..  It looks very similar to a tomato plant in terms of the leaves, flowers, and...fruit? (for lack of a better word)...but it's thorny and low-growing.  I *know* it's not a good thing for them to eat because I *know* it's at least in the nightshade _family_...and they do generally avoid it...but I have seen them plow right through it, too.

Here's another one you'll want to avoid in Kentucky...poison hemlock.  You'll usually see it growing in big patches..  Looks a bit like queen anne's lace, but it's really tall...like 6-8 feet tall.  Goats generally do a pretty good job of avoiding it on their own.  A friend of mine told me it's SUPER bitter...whenever he finds something his goats won't eat, he eats some of it to find out why.

Don't ask -- I dunno..  

Poison hemlock:


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## jodief100

Thank you so much!   the ironweed is what I was asking about.  Can the goats eat it?  We have lots of the hemlock too and I have seen them eat it without ill effects.  They only take a bite or two and move on.  I knew it was in the hemlock family because of the leaf shape, but not all hemlocks are poisonous.  Carrots are hemlocks.

I think the bullthistle is one I have been wondering about.  Looks like little green tomatoes with stripes and it has small thorns?  I just found A BUNCH of it in my lower pasture and had no idea what it was.  The goats don't go down there; they have access but why walk all that way when there is plenty of good stuff close to the barn?  I guess I had better work on clearing it out.  It is taking over down by the creek.    

The only thing I have been ripping out so far is the jimson weed.  It is pretty easy to get if you get it fast enough.


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## cmjust0

jodief100 said:
			
		

> Thank you so much!   the ironweed is what I was asking about.  Can the goats eat it?


Yep.  



> We have lots of the hemlock too and I have seen them eat it without ill effects.  They only take a bite or two and move on.  I knew it was in the hemlock family because of the leaf shape, but not all hemlocks are poisonous.  Carrots are hemlocks.


Yeah, it kinda looks like a gigantic carrot or something..  Livestock usually won't do much with it.



> I think the bullthistle is one I have been wondering about.  Looks like little green tomatoes with stripes and it has small thorns?  I just found A BUNCH of it in my lower pasture and had no idea what it was.  The goats don't go down there; they have access but why walk all that way when there is plenty of good stuff close to the barn?  I guess I had better work on clearing it out.  It is taking over down by the creek.


That's the stuff..  I'm gonna have to figure out what it is..  My old hay guy calls it bullthistle, and I've heard other people call it that.  I'm about 99.9% it's a nightshade, and nightshades are generally not great.  



> The only thing I have been ripping out so far is the jimson weed.  It is pretty easy to get if you get it fast enough.


Forgot all about Jimsonweed!  I hate that stuff...  My wife grew "moonflowers" one year, which are basically ornamental jimsonweed -- NEVER AGAIN.  

My dad liked it, so he took some seeds from us back to his place..  He also took some okra seeds for his garden.  Problem was, he confused the two and basically planted a whole row of jimsonweed in his garden.

They figured out what happened and pulled it up juuuuuuuust before it went to seed and BURNED IT.


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## aggieterpkatie

I'm not sure how much milkweed would cause an issue, but I'm not sure I'd chance it. :/  Which is a PITA when there's a bunch of milkweed where you want to graze.  

We have had animals get sick on Mountain Laurel, which is a relative of azaleas and Rhodos, so I would not chance it with those either.  Or Yews.  A handful of yew can kill a horse.  

And CM, nightshade and bull thistle are two different plants.  Nightshade is toxic, as is it's cousin horsenettle.  I'm not sure about thistles. It's my understanding that some thistles are ok, but I think sow thistle is not.  Well, I dont' know for sure, I need to look it up.  I know my goats have eaten thistle before...they actually love it.  Growing up, my sister didn't latch the gate properly and one of my lambs escaped and ate a plant resembling sow thistle...not positive what it was, but the lamb keeled over dead within the hour.


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## aggieterpkatie

Oh, and I also wanted to mention that when we made hay we'd always avoid one patch that had milkweed in it.  It's best to not risk it.


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## aggieterpkatie

Just found this  on Wiki (so do with it what you will):



> Milkweed is toxic and may cause death when animals consume 10% of their body weight in any part of the plant. Milkweed also causes mild dermatitis in some who come in contact with it.


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## cmjust0

aggieterpkatie said:
			
		

> And CM, nightshade and bull thistle are two different plants.  Nightshade is toxic, as is it's cousin horsenettle.


Just looked up horsenettle...VERY SIMILAR to what I'm talking about, if not the same exact thing.  Interestingly, some folks apparently also call it bullnettle.  

And lots of folks use thistle and nettle interchangeably..

Could explain why it seems to go by bullthistle around here..

Think I'm just gonna call the stuff horsenettle from now on, though, as pictures of horsenettle are as close to what I'm talking about as I've gotten so far..  

I *knew* it was in the nightshade family, though.  



> I'm not sure about thistles. It's my understanding that some thistles are ok, but I think sow thistle is not.  Well, I dont' know for sure, I need to look it up.  I know my goats have eaten thistle before...they actually love it.  Growing up, my sister didn't latch the gate properly and one of my lambs escaped and ate a plant resembling sow thistle...not positive what it was, but the lamb keeled over dead within the hour.


Hmm...dunno what that would have been.   

We have zero purple thistle anywhere a goat's had access..  Reason being, goats LOVE purple thistle....so much, in fact, that they eat them before they ever have a chance to go to seed.   

I recall that soremouth is sometimes called "thistle disease."  Goat with soremouth browses thistle, gets the virus on the thistle's thorns, then the next goat comes along and 'injects' itself with soremouth by getting stuck with the thorns.


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## cmjust0

aggieterpkatie said:
			
		

> Just found this  on Wiki (so do with it what you will):
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Milkweed is toxic and may cause death when animals consume 10% of their body weight in any part of the plant. Milkweed also causes mild dermatitis in some who come in contact with it.
Click to expand...

Thassa lotta milkweed.  :/

I saw .25% to 2% in 'Goat Medicine' a few minutes ago..  Didn't copy it, though...I'll see if I can find it again.  I do remember seeing that the reference was from a study done in the 60's.

Maybe goats are getting _better_ at eating milkweed.


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## aggieterpkatie

cmjust0 said:
			
		

> And lots of folks use thistle and nettle interchangeably..
> 
> Could explain why it seems to go by bullthistle around here..


Yeah, it certainly doesn't help when there are 10 names for every plant depending on where you're located.  



> Hmm...dunno what that would have been.


I wish I knew! I'd recognize it if I saw it though...makes for hard IDing when you don't know what to google.


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## warthog

We have what is known as tropical milkweed, different leaf shape to the one posted and orange flowers.

I have seen my goats nibble the odd flower and maybe the odd leaf, no problems.  My land has the plant all over and would be impossible to erradicate.  But they seem to know what they are doing.

The vet pointed out one of my decorative plants yesterday (Lantana) and said that this was highly toxic, and I am sure she is right.

However, some months ago when my goats escaped they feasted on this plant with no ill effects.

I am begining to think that some of these toxic plants, are only toxic at different growth stages and if consumed in great quantities, but how do we know.    I think to some extent we have to leave it up to them. 

I also believe that they will only eat these plants if very hungry and nothing else is available.

JMO :/


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## freemotion

Shiloh Acres said:
			
		

> Hmmm ... I love azaleas. I haven't done any real landscaping yet but I had figured I "couldn't have" azaleas and such. In case the goats got out and took a tiny bite and fell over dead.
> 
> I will probably avoid azaleas and known poisonous plants anyway. Still ... A few years ago I wanted to get a few Pygmy goats but was told they'd die if they got to the azaleas. It was a rented house, so I couldn't remove the plants, so I passed on the goats.


Skip the azaleas....very poisonous.  There is poisonous, and there is POISONOUS.  Apparently azaleas are yummy.  I've had problems with wild ones here.  They are most toxic when growing in the spring.  I also had a goat escape and mow a small rhododendron to the ground with no ill effects, but it was in the middle of winter and the plant was about a foot high by a foot wide, a recently planted miniature.  I lost another goat to wild azalea in the spring.  I think my baby doeling barfed all night recently from wild azalea creeping into my pasture along one end.

On the other hand, there are many plants in my pasture that appear on poisonous lists and have not been a problem.  Nightshade, cherry, oak, red maple, black walnut, poke, lilac, etc.


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## savingdogs

I did not see which of my goats ate the azaleas so did not know who to watch, but all three appeared normal and they consumed probably 1/10 th of an enormous azalea just last month. It was past bloom and is a very old plant. I was extremely concerned but they seemed fine.

They are so good about getting through fences and such and seem to make a beeline right for the forbidden plants as soon as they do.....


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## Shiloh Acres

Ah, well. Thanks so much for the info. 

I really do love azaleas, but it's not worth endangering my animals. Mine are not escape artists but someone left a gate open once and they all got into the unfemced front yard. Accidents happen. And my favorite doe can actually jump a four foot fence. Most of my fences ate four foot. I guess she forgot or hasn't thought of it. 

Sigh ... Ok, no azaleas or rhododendrons. Maybe someday I'll get a double-fenced personal garden with ten-foot walls. Like I wouldn't spend the money on pastures or vegetable gardens first, LOL. OK, guess I'll have to content myself with public gardens somewhere.  Anyway roses are nice (and delicious I hear!).


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## Hykue

If the sow thistle others are referring to is the same as the sow thistle here, my goats LOVE it.  It's high on their list of favorites, along with dandelion, raspberry, dogbane (apparently poisonous after frost . . . I'm hoping they'll have eaten it all by then), quaking aspen, and brome grass.  They will nibble on most everything else, but one of them positively seeks out sow thistle.  I haven't ever read anything claiming that it's poisonous.  Just thought I'd mention . . . I don't think this is the culprit.  They also eat narrow-leaved hawkweed, which looks quite a bit like sow thistle, but they don't eat nearly so much of it.  They might even be avoiding it, it seems to still have a lot of flowers in my pasture when they've eaten all the sow thistle flowers.


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## Drk_wlf

I had the same thing happen to me when we put our mixed herd of sheep and goats into a new pen. There where some milkweed plants but within about five minutes there were no more. It seems it was the first thing they ate. I was like "ok, I thought that was poisonus" but they didn't get sick.  Oh well I have much to learn.


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## savingdogs

I envy your knowledge of weeds. I see the same ones but don't know their names. Where did you learn how to identify all these weeds? I realize they may be different from state to state. 

I'm from California and live in Washington now, I was much better with naming the plants and bugs in CA! 

You should SEE our slugs.......but I'm not even sure if milkweed grows in Western WA and OR.


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## SDGsoap&dairy

savingdogs said:
			
		

> You should SEE our slugs....


  You're not kidding.  I grew up in Washington and now live in North Georgia.  I RARELY see slugs here and the ones I've seen have been itty-bitty by comparison.  Slugs in WA are as ubiquitous as they are enormous.  There are some neat ones over in the Olympic rainforest.  Not so neat when they're discovered with bare feet (a childhood memory all born and raised Washingtonians have)...


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