Raising Goats Naturally

by Deborah Niemann

  Goats can have TSE for a couple of years before developing symptoms, which include scratching and rubbing on fencing and housing, as well as biting at its legs and sides. A goat may lose weight and have neurological symptoms, such as tremors, incoordination, excessive salivation, and blindness.

  Tests are available for the presence of TSE. If you want to export goats, most countries require that you have a number of years of negative herd test results. For the US to be declared scrapie free, we have to go seven years with no cases. As of this writing, the last diagnosed case was in 2016 with only four infected goat herds identified from 2013 to 2015, so it appears we are getting closer to complete eradication. If you want to export goats, you can enroll in the Scrapie-Free Flock Certification Program.

  Skin Cancer

  Goats can get skin cancer anywhere they have exposed skin. White goats or other goats with light pink skin are most at risk. Peri-anal squamous cell carcinoma is one of the most common forms seen in goats because they walk around with their tails up, so the skin under the tail is exposed to the sun. It starts out looking like the goat has warts or hemorrhoids (which they don’t get), and as they increase in size, they start to bleed. In a conference room filled with a couple of dozen vets from around the US, none were aware of any cases that had been successfully treated, although some had tried surgery and radiation. One vet said that when she had done necropsies on goats with skin cancer, the cancer had spread throughout the pelvic region, which is why surgery is not helpful.

  This peri-anal squamous cell carcinoma showed up on my goat Lizzie when she was 12 years old.

  I learned about skin cancer in goats several months after I had a goat with peri-anal squamous cell carcinoma. Our local vet had never seen a case of it before, so she thought it was some kind of injury and skin infection. She instructed me to clean it daily, which the goat hated, and to try a variety of antibiotics, both injectable and topical. Nothing worked. We eventually put down the goat when she began losing weight and we saw her grinding her teeth (a sign of pain) every time she pooped. Since skin cancer in goats is not very common as you go farther north in North America, vets in those areas may have never seen it before and may make the same misdiagnosis as mine did. Although euthanasia is the usual recommendation, it is important to get the right diagnosis so that you don’t waste time treating a goat for an infection that it does not have.

  Sore Mouth

  In spite of its simple name, this condition is far more than a sore on the mouth. Contagious ecthyma, also known as orf or sore mouth, infects sheep and camelids as well as goats. The main symptom is that all hairless parts of the body can be covered in crusty sores, which are highly contagious to other small ruminants and humans. In addition to the mouth, there may also be sores on eyelids, vulva, teats, and even places with little hair, such as ears and scrotum. However, a single sore in one of those places is probably not sore mouth, as it spreads like wildfire. The sores are painful, so an infected goat might not eat much, which will lead to weight loss, and kids may even die when infected because their mouth is so sore that they stop nursing. Does may get sores on their teats if infected kids nurse. Pus and scabs are highly contagious and can contaminate a pasture for years. Once an outbreak starts in a herd, it usually winds up infecting all goats, and if an individual goat does not get open sores on the mouth, it is possible that it is subclinically infected. A subclinically infected animal is infectious and can infect other animals if sold. People who handle infected goats should always wear rubber gloves because of the risk of infection to humans.

  No treatment is available, and it usually takes a month or longer for the sores to heal. There is a vaccine, but it is a live virus, which will cause a crusty sore at the site of the vaccine, and goats should be considered carriers for several weeks after vaccination. For this reason, the vaccine is seldom used in herds that do not have a history of sore mouth. Unlike the CL vaccine, it can be given to goats that have the disease.

  Tetanus

  Goats are infected by tetanus through an open wound, and preventing wounds is not always easy, especially when they can occur through regular goat maintenance, such as hoof trimming.

  The main symptom of tetanus in goats is muscle rigidity. If the animal is able to stand, it will have all four legs spread far apart like a rocking horse. Once it goes down, it will have its legs and neck extended rigidly. A vet should be called immediately because the disease can progress very rapidly.

  Treatment for tetanus is often unsuccessful, so prevention is key. For example, avoid castration methods that break the skin, including the use of elastrator bands, which create an anaerobic environment under the band while the scrotum is dying and preparing to fall off. A vaccine is available, which must be given annually for continued protection, and tetanus antitoxin is available to treat animals that have recently been injured, regardless of whether they have been previously vaccinated. Most veterinary texts recommend cleaning all wounds and flushing with hydrogen peroxide, as well as leaving the wound open to air, rather than bandaging it. Some also recommend applying an antibiotic locally.

  Tuberculosis

  Tuberculosis is extremely rare in goats, and most states are certified TB-free. Humans can contract TB through drinking unpasteurized milk, so it is a good idea to have your goats tested if you have any doubts about their TB status. This is a chronic wasting disease in goats and will cause poor milk production, diarrhea, and weight loss along with a chronic cough. There is no treatment for livestock with TB.

  Urinary Stones (Urinary Calculi)

  The male goat has a very small urethra, which is the tube through which urine leaves the body. Research in cattle shows that early castration causes the urethra to be even smaller. Because a goat’s penis is so small, a very tiny urinary stone can cause a blockage. A buck standing in the usual position to pee and unable to produce urine may have a stone blocking the urethra. Without treatment, the bladder or urethra can rupture within a day or two and cause death. Contact the vet as soon as you realize the buck is not able to pass urine normally. Treatment with ammonium chloride may work if it is started soon enough. Otherwise, a variety of surgical options are available.

  Minerals or feed with added ammonium chloride can be used for prevention, but diet is an important contributor to this problem. Urinary calculi are most often seen in bucks or wethers that are on diets with a large amount of grain. Bucks do not normally need grain, and because wethers have an even smaller urethra, they should definitely not receive grain.

  White Muscle Disease

  The name white muscle disease is often used synonymously with selenium deficiency in young kids, but it can also be caused by vitamin E deficiency. Kids deficient in selenium or vitamin E are weak and often die. Selenium deficiency is more common, but if a kid is not responding to BoSe injections, then supplementing with vitamin E may be your next step. See the sections on selenium and vitamin E under the discussion of nutritional deficiencies for more information.

  Vaccines

  The decision about whether or not to vaccinate your goats is a very personal one. I firmly believe that you should make the decision that will help you sleep at night. Neither choice is risk free. Some people would feel terrible if they had a goat die of a disease for which a vaccine exists, while others would feel worse if a healthy goat died from a reaction to a vaccine. There are many experienced breeders who have made different decisions on vaccinating. As with so many choices, there is no one right decision when it comes to vaccinating goats. The only routine vaccine is CDT, and it does not have the best track record with breeders, which is why this is not a slam-dunk decision.

  In the first edition of this book, I did not state whether or not I vaccinated my goats because I did not want to affect the reader’s own decision to vaccinate or not. However, that did not stop readers from making assumptions about what I do, and I found myself being criticized from both sides. For the record, I did vaccinate my goats for CDT for the first three or four
years we had goats. But after talking to several breeders who had vaccinated goats die from enterotoxemia, I decided to stop vaccinating. I was always very nervous on vaccination day because when we were still city dwellers, I had a cat that almost died from a routine vaccination. I would only vaccinate my goats when I knew the vet office was open, even though I had a vial of adrenaline available so I could immediately treat a case of anaphylaxis. After learning that the vaccine was not terribly effective, I did not feel it was worth the risk to continue using it. Obviously, many people have chosen differently.

  We have had one doe die from enterotoxemia in the 12 years since we stopped vaccinating, but it was obviously from a feeding mistake made by us humans. My husband normally cuts grass and weeds with his scythe during the summer, and we gather it up and put it in the hay feeders in the barn for the goats to eat when they go inside at night. One day an intern gathered up the hay and put it into our little hay wagon early in the morning. That evening when he went to put it in the hay feeders, he realized it was hot. He asked my husband if it was okay, and since my husband didn’t smell anything, he said it was fine. It was not. It had clearly started to grow something, as indicated by the heat, but no one realized what was happening until the next day after a goat became ill and died. We all learned a valuable lesson about not feeding anything questionable.

  The C and D in the CDT vaccine is for clostridium perfringens types C and D, which causes the disease enterotoxemia and the T is for tetanus. CDT is available without a prescription in most farm supply stores and online. Some goat keepers continue vaccinating for as long as they have goats; others decide to stop for a variety of reasons specific to their farm or their philosophy.

  Anaphylactic shock is a possibility following any vaccine, so it is a good idea to have injectable adrenaline available, which is a prescription drug available from a vet.

  It is not unheard of for a vaccinated goat to get enterotoxemia, which has led some breeders to vaccinate every goat two or even three times per year, although the manufacturer does not recommend this. Many people also will vaccinate a few goats today, a few more next week, and a few more next month using the same bottle, even though the manufacturer instructions say that the entire contents should be used when the bottle is first opened. It seems prudent that if you are going to use a vaccine, you should follow the manufacturer’s recommendation for best results. When I asked one manufacturer about the instructions, they said that the efficacy of the vaccine could not be guaranteed after the vial was opened because they did not include a preservative. This is not true of all brands, however, but it will clearly state on the label if a preservative, such as formaldehyde, is included.

  For those who choose to vaccinate with CDT, kids usually receive their first injection at five to six weeks of age and then get a second shot three to four weeks later. Annual booster shots are recommended. Does are usually vaccinated about a month before kidding so that the antibodies are passed on to the kids before birth. You should know a goat’s vaccination status when you purchase it if you plan to continue vaccinating. Annual injections will not be very effective if the goat did not receive the first two shots three to four weeks apart.

  Vaccines are available for abortions, CL, pneumonia, and sore mouth, although they are not usually used in herds where these conditions or diseases are not a problem. It is best to consult with a vet to determine if there is a need to use any of these vaccines in your herd. Most of those vaccines should only be used in herds where the disease already exists. Some breeders also vaccinate for rabies, although there isn’t a rabies vaccine approved for use in goats, which means your vet will have to use a vaccine created for a different species.

  CHAPTER 8

  BREEDING

  If you are raising your goats to produce your own milk and meat, they need to be bred regularly. If you decide to breed goats of different breeds, ideally their mature size should be similar. When breeding two goats from breeds that are different sizes, the buck should always be from the smaller breed so that you don’t encounter difficulties during kidding. The average Nigerian Dwarf kid is about three pounds at birth, while the average standard-sized kid can easily be seven or eight pounds, and a meat goat kid can be ten pounds or more, so it is easy to see that you could wind up with a caesarean section on a doe that was bred by a buck from a larger breed.

  Breeding Season

  It is common practice to breed goats to kid annually. For example, a doe kids in January and starts producing milk. Seven months later, in August, she is bred so that she will freshen again in January. Milking is stopped when she is three months pregnant so that her body can concentrate on putting all of its energy into the growing kids during the last two months of pregnancy. You can see that if you stagger breeding by three or four months, you will never be without fresh milk.

  Most goats are seasonal breeders, meaning they get pregnant only in the late summer or fall for late winter or spring kidding. Goat breeds that originated in equatorial Africa may be able to breed off-season but there are no guarantees. Many sources say that Nigerians are year-round breeders, which is true in their homeland, but in North America where days get shorter in winter and longer in summer, it’s not always true. In my herd, less than 20 percent of my does can be bred for late summer or fall kidding, meaning August through October, so this led me to do an electronic survey through my website and social media, and out of 216 breeders, only 40 percent said all of their does come into heat year-round, while 25 percent said that less than half their does come into heat year round, with 5 percent saying none of their does come into heat year-round.

  Kinders are also known for year-round breeding, so I also surveyed them. Of the 25 respondents, 56 percent said that 100 percent of their does can be bred year-round, with 28 percent saying that more than 75 percent can be bred off season. Sixteen percent said that 26 to 75 percent of their does could be bred year-round, while no one said that less than 25 percent of their does could be. Although the Kinder survey was small compared to the Nigerian survey, it seems possible that they would be more likely to cycle year-round because they are a hybrid of two African goats. Nigerians have only been registered since the 1990s, and prior to that time, it’s obvious that many of them had intermixed with Swiss goats, which are seasonal breeders.

  Lacia Lynne Bailey in Washington state raises mini-LaManchas and has noticed that “my higher percentage ND mini-LaManchas are more likely to have nearly year-round heats. I’ve had does give birth in August, September, October, and November. For me the big benefit is milk peaking in winter from fall kiddings, when I have time to make cheese and want to be indoors versus spring and summer.” But breeding year-round is not for everyone. “For anyone who shows or does LA or wants to hit the max kid sales season,” she says, “they are going to breed for spring kids and not even know or try for other seasons.”

  It is possible to have milk year-round even if you have only a couple of standard breed does. You might plan to have one kid in January and one in May. The first doe kids in January and spends two months nursing kids full-time. Just as she is ready to get started sharing her milk with humans in March, the doe that is due in May should be dried off so she can put all of her energy toward growing kids.

  A doe must be in standing heat to get pregnant, which means she will stand and let a buck breed her. If she is not in heat, she’ll run away when he tries to mount her. Does come into heat about every 21 days, plus or minus two. If you see a doe in heat but you are not ready to breed her, mark your calendar and pay close attention to her behavior in three weeks so that you don’t miss her next heat cycle.

  When your doe comes into heat think about where you will be in five months. If you are planning a vacation for that time, it’s probably a good idea to postpone breeding until the doe’s next heat cycle. A breeder who lives in a cold climate and has a full-time job off the farm might choose to breed for a summer due date so that they don’t have to worry about hypothermia if they are not t
here when kids are born.

  Breeding Age

  A lot of people wonder how old a doe should be when she is first bred. Size, however, is more important than age. Although some people think a doe under a year of age may not be a good mother, this varies from goat to goat. A goat that is too small, though, will not be able to give birth. It is generally recommended that does be at 60–70 percent of their adult weight before being bred. Some does reach that size by the time they are 7 months old, although it can take up to 18 months for others. On the rare occasion that a doe doesn’t reach that size by age two, she should probably not be bred. Breeding one doe that was too small was more than enough to make me adopt a lifelong better-safe-than-sorry policy when it comes to breeding.

  Sexual maturity with bucks is individualized. There are anecdotal reports of two-month-old bucks breeding does, but there are six-month-old bucks who don’t know which end of the doe to mount. Just because a buckling is mounting doelings does not mean that he is actually producing sperm, and everyone I know who has tried to use a two-month-old buck for breeding has failed. If it is important that your does get pregnant on a certain schedule, it’s a good idea to use bucks that are at least six to eight months old.

  On the flip side, however, this does not mean that it’s okay to leave intact young bucks with their mothers and sisters until they’re six months old. Bucklings should either be castrated at two months of age or removed from does no later than three months of age. When it comes to sexual maturity of bucklings, it seems that Murphy’s Law is in full force. If you want a four-month-old buck to breed a doe, it doesn’t happen, but if you forget to remove a young buck from a doe pen, he will mature early.