Training a screaming goat.

[Our7Wonders]

Just updating. It's been almost a week. So far everything is about the same. She makes a little noise, gets a little shock and then she's mostly quiet throughout the day. She hollars a little first thing in the morning when it's milking and feeding time, before she gets her collar on - but it's not bad.

She seems sad though. Before her screaming became obsessive she was social with her talking - and I liked that. She's not doing that now. I miss it, so maybe it's me that's sad. Hopefully when this is over we can get back to that. She's not off feed, normal goatie poo. I've been giving her occasional B complex orally in her feed along with probios every couple days just to try to ward off problems. Her milk dropped from 7 cups each milking to 4.5 cups. I kinda expected that. It's back up to between 6 and 6.5 cups each time.

I'm hopeful that a nice long break in the obsessive screaming will kick the habit for her.

She's somewhat used to it now - she doesn't freak out when it first goes on. She's quiet during the day with the collar on, and quiet at night when she's locked in. So all in all it's working.

 

[jessica117]

So glad it's working I do understand the talking thing. I love it when my goaties talk to me, but the screeming can drive you right up the wall.

 

[mshubblife]

I posted a couple weeks ago about my screaming goat and how something had to be done. I had hoped it would get better as she became used to her babies not being there. No such luck.

I had posted that I might consider a bark collar and another member posted here that she had a friend who had successfully used one.

I bought a bark collar last night and thought I might journal our results here just in case others may find it helpful. Please don't anyone bash me for doing this - it's come down to being our last ditch effort. I'm doing this to save her. If we can't get her trained to be quieter than she'll have to go. She has reached a point where she was disturbing the whole neigborhood.

So she wore the collar last night from about 6pm until 8pm. The first few rounds of *corrections* scared her. I felt horrible. Considered taking it off and then my hubby reminded me that if I truely do want to keep her this had to be done.

Within an hour of wearing it she was quietly munching on her hay - and chewing her cud. I felt bad for her though, when she's not screaming at the top of her goat lungs, she likes to *talk* to us when were out there and she can't do that with the collar on. It obviously taught her fairly quick not to scream - now the trick will be whether or not she'll eventually learn to *stay* quiet without the collar. I understand this can take some time - I'm expecting at least a couple weeks. We'll put the collar on in the morning before I let her out and milk her. She'll wear it all day and then in the evening, after milking, I'll take it off again and lock her in for the night. She's usually fairly quiet in the evenings when she's locked in.

When she received the first two rounds of corrections today she again ran around rather scared - I keep Jasmine and her babies locked up during that time because in her scared running I'm worried she'll hurt a baby. 10 minutes after it going on today she was munching hay quietly again.

It really does make me sad, but I'm working on tough love here. I love my goats and I don't want to have to get rid of her. I'm hoping this will work and we can all be one big happy family again.

I'll continue to post my results - good or bad hopefully they'll be helpful to someone else.