Sick doe..vet and I stumped

[Tapsmom]

I have a 7 year old ND Doe. She has been "off" for quite a few months. After numerous vet visits, bloodwork and a mineral panel we still have no answers. Everything came back normal. I also had a fecal done and it came back with some parasites.
It started in August. At the 4H fair she seemed unhappy and refused to eat any grain..but would nibble hay. She seemed to perk back up by the end of the weekend and return to normal. At the end of September, we went to the Big E and once we got there she appeared hunched and uncomfortable and once again started refusing grain. By a few days after we got home she had a snotty nose. We treated her with Biomycyn and that cleared up..but nothing else. After the second vet visit we tried giving her Mylanta for 5 days. It seemed to help a little. But not enough. Next vet visit we pulled bloodwork and started on B12 shots. We dropped off a fecal and treated her with Prohibit since it showed parasites and we had some coughing and wanted to make sure lungworms were not involved. Still no improvement. A mineral panel was sent out as well. It showed a little high in Selenium and a little low in Zince but everything else was normal.but I had given her some replamin not long before. The vet and I also discussed possible liver flukes so she also had me treat her with Valbazen.
She is definitely depressed and hunched. She does not have a fever. If we offer her food, she is very interested..but will nose around as though she is looking for something. Sometimes she will gobble a little down..but then usually not take a second bite. She will eat hay..but is being very selective. She is losing weight because of this and is getting cold very easily. We have been blanketing her when it is cold until we can figure out what is going on! Does anyone have any thoughts?

 

[Goat Whisperer]

Is she anemic? Does she chew cud? How does her rumin sound? I’d be giving probiotics.

 

[Goat Whisperer]

What type of hay is she on? Pics?
What type of feed are you giving her?

Will she eat beet pulp shreds?

 

[Tapsmom]

I have been giving her Probios. Her Ruman is functioning fine. I am actually going to try some beet pulp shreds tonight. I had been feeding the goats second cut hay, but she was preferring the first cut that the horses were getting. But I ran out of the first yesterday and am getting some more today. I also picked up some straight alfalfa to see if she would eat that (a small bag for small animals for her to try) which she did. She was getting Kalmbach Meat and Dairy but we have tried pretty much everything else. ( Sentinel LS(horse), Dynasty Pro(horse), Kalmbach Gameplan 18 (goat), hay stretcher, alfalfa pellets, Calf Manna) I don't have a problem if she prefers to just eat hay. She is dried up so only needs hay..but she is losing weight since she is not eating much. I will get some pics when I get home and post them.

 

[Southern by choice]

I would try a lower quality hay. Sounds like everything is too rich. When they get thrown off metabolically and start losing weight etc more often they are declining feed after one bite because it is too rich. Often happens with rich hay as well.
Being in Connecticut you don't have any leaves you can feed right now... so look for low quality hay. Peet pulp is good, you may try it wet - a warm meal so to speak.
Continue probios.

 

[greybeard]

Her rumen may be functioning, but other digestive problems can still exist.
Was an xray or ultrasound done?
Is there a chance she may have at some point, ingested a bit of hardware..glass, plastic or metal?

 

[Tapsmom]

Someone else had mentioned Xray or ultrasound as well. I did get both the first cut hay and the beets pulp tonight. I had also been giving her some Nutridrench to get calories in her. Should I stop that do you think? I have spent quite a bit on vet bills so far and unfortunately I am still paying those off. But I have a call in to the vet to ask about Xrays, too.
At dinner time she was very happy with the 1st cut hay.

 

[Southern by choice]

1st cut hay generally has less protein. I suspect your doe is having metabolic issues and perhaps that is why she is preferring the 1st cut.
By any chance is she still in milk? You can look at her numbers and gain a great deal of info in regard to MUN levels and Fat : Protein ratios.
Fatrotein inversion can cause so many issues.
Some signs... weight loss, reluctant to eat the normal feed such as dairy goat feed, high quality hay etc.

I am familiar with Fat : Protein inversion I have a Nubian that last year tanked. Perfectly healthy, kidded... 3 weeks later she started to plummet. No milk fever, no parasites, everything good on bloodwork. What we didn't have was the milk data info but I had read an article and it kept coming to me that this may be her issue. She lost 60# in a month time. Wouldn't eat anything... except the worst hay and maybe some leaves. She was pretty much on deaths door... we ended up drying her off and working with her. Long story short she ended up gaining all the weight back in 2 months.
Of course when she first started losing weight we tried doing what would seem "normal", give more quality feed. She would take a bite then nothing.... her body knew she couldn't do this.

We dealt with it like Fat: Protein inversion yet we had no official diagnosis for it.

Skip forward- This year our does were on milktest. We had 3 goats that had the Fat: Protein inversion! We had to really adjust their diet to reduce the protein and we used the data from the MUN levels to also adjust the feed. Our suspicion from last year was correct ... each doe that showed Fatrotein inversion numbers were losing weight. We ended up switching to a horse feed, lower in protein. The interesting thing is we didn't feed an excessively high protein feed. BTW it was a particular "line" of our goats either. It was a nubian, a lamancha. and a dwarf!

I do believe what Greybeard suggested is important to look at. A friend of mine had a goat die, not from hardware but because the goat ate string and ended up getting impacted.

 

[Tapsmom]

She is drinking, pooping and peeing normally. She is still picking through the first cutting hay. I offered her both wet and dry beet pulp shreds this morning and she was not overly interested.
Southern by choice, How did you get the weight back on her? I am offereing her the first cut hay. I also left a bowl of the dry and wet beet pulp with her. She did head over and chew on her salt block and take some minerals then took a long drink as well. But are there other food that you were able to get her to eat?

 

[Southern by choice]

I went back and re read your post.

I see the time line as far as the shows.
Do you remember the timeline for the rest...

Dates of parasite treatments? Last follow up? Eggs Per Gram Counts?
When was the mineral analysis done?
What is her current FAMACHA?