peachick said:
I gave him some fresh hay a few minutes ago... he pushed it around a little but didnt eat anything.
no nasal discharge.
no sign of diarrhea
I dont know what scouring is - Im a total newbie.
Fever. Hmm ok. I can take that... what is normal temp for a goat??
and THANK YOU for the reply!!
Scouring = diarrhea.
Normal temp would be like 101-103, give or take. If the temp's 104 or more and it's not super hot outside, I consider it a fever and start them on some kind of antibiotic.. The antibiotic would depend on what kind of infection I suspect we're talking about. My usual "I dunno what this is yet" antibiotic in anything over 6mo's and/or about 75lbs is Bio-Mycin 200...oxytetracycline hydrochloride. I'll give about 3ml/100lbs, SQ, once a day for about 5 days.
If the goat's under that weight/age, my go-to is PenG.. That's 1ml/15lbs 2x/day through an 18ga needle...20ga will work if you wuss out on the friggin' stovepipe that
is an 18ga needle.
If his temp's less than 100, call a vet.
If his temp's in the normal range, it's probably not an infection.
EDIT -- Just read that his temp's good...that's good.
Kinda almost wish it would have been as simple as an infection somewhere, but this might mean it turns out to be nothing.
Is he peeing OK?...a 6mo buckling might be a candidate for urinary calculi. Make sure he's peeing.
Also, has he been dewormed? If not, check the color of the mucous membranes of his inner eyelids. If they're pale pink or white, he's probably got a heavy worm load. That can *sometimes* lead them to be depressed, just from weakness and anemia...usually not, though. If he's pink, or pale pink, I'd probably look for another problem. If he's whited out, though...that could be it.
Has he been on any kind of coccidia preventative? If not, a 6mo goat isn't out of the woods. If he's on some kind of coccidiostatic grain (w/ deccox, rumensen, monensen, etc) that's *probably* not it...but if he hasn't, and if you haven't ever done any kind of preventative (DiMethox, Sulmet, etc)...consider coccidia. Without a scour, it would be a "chronic" or "subclinical" or "subacute" case, depending on what terminology you want to use. Basically, would just mean he's suffering from a heavy coccidia load -- but not heavy enough to make him scour.
So that's infection...worms...coccidia...urinary calculi...I'm trying to think of what else we could be looking at, but given his age and gender, those are the things I would look at
first.
ANOTHER EDIT: If he were here, I'd just keep watching him closely. If he didn't perk up, I'd probably use some fortified b-complex to see if I could perk him up and get him to eat a little bit.
