# Can goats "catch" CAE?



## michickenwrangler (Apr 9, 2010)

I keep my goats at my neighbors house and have kept my doe there since last November.

About a month ago, she said that she wants to maintain a closed herd as she's worried about diseases coming in. My daughter wants to take our now-wethered buckling to the county fair this summer. She says if we take him off the property, he can't come back. My husband still isn't 100% sure he wants the goats here as we don't have a barn we can convert and he's worried about the expense of buying a shed or building a small barn.

The other issue is that she has Toggs and Saanens and I have a LaMancha doe that I want bred to a LaMancha buck. Again, same issue. I don't really want a LaMancha cross, I would like to have a purebred kid.

She made this decision months after I bought my doe and began keeping her there. She's mainly worried about CAE and is convinced that as soon as I take the goats to a fair or breeding farm they're going to come back with CAE.

I tried to rationalize that I take my horse to distance rides all over the state. Some like Grand Island and Shore-to-Shore attract riders from all over the US and even Canada and my horse has never brought anything home to infect other horses. That and a scrapies test is required to enter the fair, so at least that won't be spread. At the fair, goats and sheep are in separate barns.

I thought CAE was spread through shared needle or blood-to-blood contact (and milk too).

So, will it be spread through nose-to-nose contact? How expensive is AI for goats?

Help me out here


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## aggieterpkatie (Apr 9, 2010)

It's fairly hard for goats to catch CAE at a fair.  There would have to be some mode of transmission.  It's not like your goat would be close enough to nurse another goat, and what are the odds of coming in contact with blood of another goat?


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## lasergrl (Apr 9, 2010)

CL exposure is pretty darned high though.


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## Roll farms (Apr 9, 2010)

Yeah....She should be a lot more afraid of "catching" cl than she is of "catching" cae.
Has her herd been tested for either???
Can't really maintain a closed herd if you're not sure yours is clean.


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## cmjust0 (Apr 12, 2010)

Well, as I see it, it doesn't really matter what the chances are that your goat will return carrying CAE, CL, Johne's, anthelmintic-resistant parasites, lice, mites, soremouth, or any of the other 1,933,573 terrible things that can befall a goat.....because it's her property, her barn, and her herd they're going to bring it back to.  That makes it her decision.  Period..

If I were you -- and I'm not, of course -- but if I were, I'd breed to whatever buck she had handy and be thankful to have little airplane-eared babies and fresh goats milk and a good relationship with the neighbor who got me started in goats in the first place.

Afterall, she did you a HUGE solid by allowing you to keep your goat in her herd to begin with.

JMO.


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## ksalvagno (Apr 12, 2010)

Can you bring your goats home to your own property? It will make things much easier if you want things a certain way.

That is the problem with boarding. You have to abide by the boarder's rules.


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## michickenwrangler (Apr 12, 2010)

I would have to build a barn, and on the better locations for that, we wouldn't be able to have electric out there (dang pond). DH and I have talked about it, but he isn't thrilled with the idea of having goats at home.

Thing is, where I board my horse at, a boarder there and a girl who takes lessons each have goats that go to local fairs, so I'm probably already bringing those germs onto the property. Which actually, I just took my 2 kids to that same boarding stable last Friday since it was farm call/Coggins day for horses and since I have to pay my share of the farm call, I thought I'd have the vet castrate the buckling and look at the hernia on my doeling. The one boarder who has goats also works at TSC (I see her there more than I do at the barn!) and probably also comes into contact with germs from other local goat owners.

Neighbor also heard that there was a CL scare at Iosco County fair a few years ago. I don't plan to go to that particular fair, but I'm sure there are animals that do the other two counties in our rural tri-county area.

We still have time to decide. Also, she did say she wouldn't charge me for stud fees for her bucks since I'm kinda stuck using hers.  :/

Cmjust, my goats were already there before she decided to close her herd. My daughter was already working with the buckling (now wethered) to get used to working with him.


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## michickenwrangler (Apr 12, 2010)

cmjust0 said:
			
		

> Well, as I see it, it doesn't really matter what the chances are that your goat will return carrying CAE, CL, Johne's, anthelmintic-resistant parasites, lice, mites, soremouth, or any of the other 1,933,573 terrible things that can befall a goat.....because it's her property, her barn, and her herd they're going to bring it back to.  That makes it her decision.  Period..
> 
> If I were you -- and I'm not, of course -- but if I were, I'd breed to whatever buck she had handy and be thankful to have little airplane-eared babies and fresh goats milk and a good relationship with the neighbor who got me started in goats in the first place.
> 
> ...


I'm not mad at her and she's not a bad person, but my daughter who hasn't shown much interest in horses is very dedicated to the goats, bottle feeds twice a day almost without fail (only when she's sick she doesn't) and plays with the goats and walks them and helps us feed and everything else, and now I have to tell her that she can't show Bear at the fair this year.

It's even worse now since I found out she's too young to even show a chicken!

She can show a beef calf, a dairy calf, a lamb or a kid, but for some reason you have to be older to show chickens. :/


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## aggieterpkatie (Apr 13, 2010)

michickenwrangler said:
			
		

> cmjust0 said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


So what are you planning on doing with your wether? Were you going to keep him as a pet or sell him?  If you were planning on selling him, couldn't you just sell him from the fair? That way she could show him?  If you were planning on keeping him, could you ask her about quarantining for at least 30 days when you get back from the fair (if you have a seperate area away from her other animals)?


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## michickenwrangler (Apr 13, 2010)

He's going to get broke to drive, so pet with skills. I'll speak with her about it, although since a neighboring county had a CL scare, I don't know if she'll go for it.


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