Soft stools in 7-week kid

[makingshift]

You are going to be a great goat owner.?

Thanks. I needed to hear that. It's a steeper learning curve than chickens and ducks, that's for sure! They gave me syringes of two meds, one labelled "M" and one "P". I can't remember their full names!

Do y'all think I can continue feeding grains, then? Should I continue with the sweet feed or switch back to the all-stock pellets or mix them?

 

[Southern by choice]

Keep doing what you are but with the feed be gradual in the change. IMO loose stool is a hay only day or two... depending on the cause.
You do want to know exactly what was given.
This way when you do a recheck on the fecal you can see how well the dewormer worked.
The cocci med... there are different kinds and only one I know of that is given once is Toltrazuril. So something is off here. Normally you would retreat for a wormload, depending on the EPG counts, in another 10 days.
Cocci treatments, other than the one above- as far as I know of- are generally 5 day treatments.
Was this a goat vet? I ask because many horse and or cattle vets are not great with goats. Just sayin.

 

[makingshift]

I called the vet and they gave us Panacure paste and Marquis paste. The Marquis is the toltrazuril you mentioned so I think that is good. The other was for the strongyle worms. They asked me to bring in another fecal sample in 10-14 days to recheck. My usual vet (dog/cat) doesn't treat goats so I went to a livestock vet that does horses, cows, and other livestock (including goats). I don't know if they specialize in goats. We saw dogs and horses there today. I'm going to ask around to see if there is a goat specialist in the area.

 

[Southern by choice]

Sounds good. The Marquis paste is a horse product, a lot of goat vets use Co-rid and Di-methox for cocci but the Toltrazuril is the way to go. DonnaBelle I believe posted this and it is a really effective treatment. I've seen too many struggle with the Co-rid and the Di-methox.... glad you got the Marquis paste. We have used the Toltrazuril on new kids that we are bringing in... they go into a 30 day quarantine so they don't dump cocci on my land as well as worms.
Panacur is Fenbendazole... also called Safeguard. This is a dewormer you should just have on hand. There is paste and also a liquid form that says for goats on it. Sounds like they may be good with goats... that is always a plus. Building a good relationship with a vet is really important.
Well you are well on your way to getting them all parasite free! YAY!

 

[elevan]

I've just caught myself up on this thread. Glad you took in a fecal!

In answer to your question on them being brought in and why it's a bad idea...most of us keep our houses at least a 20-30 degree difference than the outside temperature in winter. That is an extreme temperature shift, much more so than would normally happen with a cold snap outside. This can lead to stress related parasite blooms and sometimes lung / upper respiratory infections.

Here is the goat vitals link that Southern mentioned: http://www.backyardherds.com/resources/goat-vitals.14/

Definitely get that repeat fecal done in 10-14 days. Fenbendazole (Panacur) is one of the drugs that tend to have a problem with parasite resistance buildup. That may or may not be the case in your area, but if it is then you'll want to repeat the de-worming with a different de-wormer...jmho.

As a new goat owner I would highly suggest that you either read through my goat articles (articles at the top of the page...then click on goats) or consider purchasing my eBook (it is sold through the BYC store). The articles are excerpts from the book. You'll find the link to the eBook in my signature below.

 

[makingshift]

Elevan- thank you for that info. I'll definitely check out your articles. I moved the goats outdoors- they have a small, secure run and a doghouse full of hay. We are working on a bigger (20x50') run but that requires that we work on fencing.

I have a feeling that in our mild climate (Austin, TX) we will have a lot of trouble with parasites. I have some reading and research to do about that. I want to have a plan. I'm interested in learning more about the herbal dewormers, too. I read about those a little bit at the Fias Co Farms site.

 

[elevan]

IMHO herbal dewomers are best used as a preventative, so if you start them when you have a clean fecal then you may be good. Make sure you do regular fecals to check the effectiveness of anything herbal that you use. You're right that your climate will make for easy parasite infestations. But don't let that discourage you. Practice good herd management and you'll do fine.

 

[OneFineAcre]

No one else has mentioned this so I will now. The strongyle type roundworms are not bad to deal with. Barberpole worms are the worms that cause goats the most problems. So, don't be too concerned about the strongyles.

You did not mention that the vet told you the "load" of either the coccidia or strongyle worms. Southern can tell you more about the Mcmasters test for worms that give you an Eggs per Gram count. We do fecals here ourselves, but not Mcmasters. If we start to see worm eggs or coccidia when we do fecals we will collect samples and take to the Rollins lab in Raleigh. I'm very lucky to live 10 miles from a state university with a vet school and large livestock program. Plus, the Rollins lab is with the Dept of Agriculture. So, I can get a McMasters float for $10. If you can't learn to do these yourself, you may want to see if you can find a place that can.

I had McMaster's done on 17 animals (over 6 months old) this summer. We had no barberpoles (knock on wood) only strongyles like you. We had a number of animals with 0 EPG, some with 25, 50, and 100 EPG. We had one animal with 250 EPG, and one with 500 EPG. Do you know how many I wormed? I didn't worm any of them. My vet gives 500 EPG as the threshold, but most other people say more like 1000 EPG. And the reason why you don't and everyone else will confirm, is that excess worming can lead to drug resistant worms. Oh and by the way, the doe with the 500 EPG count was down to 100 EPG a few weeks ago.

Now for coccidia. That's a different story. It kills young goats all the time. We lost our first kid this summer (out of 30 we have bred since we started this 4 years ago) and it was coccidiosis confirmed by Rollins. And this kid had no symptoms, and we give preventative treatment to ours with di-methox.

When we got our Mcmasters done they also look for coccidia. You get coccidia on a 0-5 scale. 0 being 0, 1 being "rare", 2 is "few", 3 being.... I don't remember all and I don't have it in front of me but 5 would be very bad. Out of the 17 we had mostly 0, a few 1's and one animal had a 2. Again, we didn't do anything because these animals are all over 6 months old and I think it would be unusual to not have any. When they get older, they build a resistance.

I honestly think the soft poo you saw was still likely to be dietary. But, anytime we have a kid with soft poo, we immediately treat for coccidia because you do not fool around with that.

I think your goats are going to be fine.
I think I rambled a little with this post.

 

[makingshift]

OneFineAcre- thank you! That was really informative and makes perfect sense to me. They did not tell me anything about the parasite load. Next time (in two weeks) I will definitely ask. I hope they will give me that info- my experience with doctors/vets/experts is that sometimes they are not too keen on having patients/customers who want to be educated.

I have to say that I'm pretty excited about everything I am learning.

 

[Southern by choice]

Great Post One Fine Acre!

Yes, you will hear DO NOT DEWORM til 1000 EPG Count. A practice that I agree with AND disagree with. Most of the research is done on meat goats... dairy goats and fiber goats are not meat goats! Meat goats generally are moved throughout the land and usually weigh a minimum of 110 lbs for does and up to 350lbs for bucks. My Nigerians are between 45-80 lbs. They are dairy, not meat. Management styles are also typically different. We have meat goats and dairy goats and I really believe the threshold for parasite load in a dairy goat is less. Dairy goats are producing milk, that lactating doe can stress more easily.
The idea of don't worry about other worms... it's the barberpole that is the problem is again based on the meat goat production basis and this is what is preched. The barberpole is a bloodsucker causing anemia and eventual death, so it is a big problem. However I disagree with the idea that never deworm for tapeworm or roundworms etc or non barberpole worms, that is commonly reiterated by many researchers in the goat world as well as many goat keepers. Worms (intestinal parasites) no matter what kind are still robbing the animal of nutrients. Knowing when to deworm is important. Overuse of dewormers is a really bad idea. Knowing your herd and understanding each individual animal is key. Many use the "eyelid" check method... few are trained in FAMACHA don't use the method properly don't have the color chart and don't know it is only good for the barberpole worm.
We do not dry lot, but our animals are on the land, yet we have excellent parasite resistance. We have lespedeza that grows wild here, lots of pines, acorns etc. high in tannins and therefore "coat" the parasite making it impossible to feed and reproduce yet it is not really an anthelmintic. We also practice strict quarantine protocol.
The meat goat adults coming in have been far more difficult to deal with, yet once cleaned up they have been no problem. Like OFA said sometimes the count will go down all by itself, but much of that is from management practices. That can be dry-lotting or constant moving of the herd so they are not reinfecting themselves.
Adult goats occasionally may show an oocyst, not a big deal... like OFA said, it is the young kids that are most susceptible to cocci and it is a silent killer.
We acquired a doeling recently 12 wks... ran fecal the day she came here 0 epg- 17 cocci... we waited another week... she is still in quarantine- cocci went up.. we treated with the toltrazuril. No way I'm putting her with my herd and dumping cocci all over my fields.
Good practice to always run a fecal on any new animal and then repeat 10-14 days later. We usually will take a fecal home before the purchase of any goat and see what we will be bringing home.
You will learn to love poop!