Tea Parties, Breeding Begins, Coyote Attacks, Electrocution, Hoof Saga, and Liquimycin Must Burns
Wow . . . it has been forever since I posted last D=!! Sorry about that! Things have just been so busy that when I'm done working I just want to get to bed. Anyway, I have a Saturday when I'm not working . . . too much . . . so I thought I'd at least try to post a little about what's been going on recently. A general summary anyway.
On 11/13/2008 I bred our first doe, Eliza, to Raz! It was . . . awkward =P . . . but successful. Well, we don't really know if it's truly successful until we notice that next month she does not come back into heat. She has been bred in the past, so if this pregnancy does not take it's probably because there's something wrong with Raz. That might be a bit disastrous since he's our only intact male. =/ I think it should be ok though. Since then I've bred Frosty and Triple Teat to him and I'm waiting for someone else to come into heat next. We plan to breed all of the does that are over 1 year old. Kidding season should be very busy with 15 moms kidding around the same time!
This past weekend we had a "progressive tea party" where we had tea and food at each person's home all afternoon. We started at Kristine's place and had tasty potato-spinach pancakes with sauerkraut and some Annis tea. Then we moved to Molly's and had green tea, salsa & chips, black beans, coffee cake. Next was Sarah's place (actually she moved her new couch into the duplex so we would be the "first butts to grace its presence." =P ) where we had champagne or sparkling grape juice, chocolate mousse with raspberries and sour cream, goat cheese torte, and sheep cheese bread sticks =D~. She went nuts! Then we went to my room (I got a new roomie named Jennifer who will be volunteering for 5 weeks) where Jennifer and I had put up Christmas slide show pictures on both our computers, played Celtic Christmas hymns, hung Christmas lights on a small potted tree, bought candy canes, baked chocolate mint-chip cookies, and made hot chocolate. Bethel also made apricot scones. We put a blanket on the floor with some pillows for everyone to sit at. It was a fantastic time! =D
Just before that (I'm not really going in any order here) we had another coyote attack. They got poor Jugs (full name Juggernaut). Of all the kids in the back pasture he was the largest and most healthy . . . it doesn't make sense to me why he would be the one to get picked off. I had to break the news to Jocelyne who nursed this kid back from the brink of death 5 months ago. She put so much time and energy into saving him and he was a beautiful goat. The milkers noticed that there was a goat missing but did not look for any signs of him. I was very frustrated with them because as soon as you notice a goat is missing you MUST look for them IMMEDIATELY for myriad reasons. To me that is common sense, but I guess it's not to everyone else. By the time I was told a goat had been missing it was already dark. I went out looking anyway but I couldn't find anything. The next morning I went to look right before milking. I found a hunk of torn skin and I knew that he was dead and not just lost. After milking I went back and searched for his body.
************************Warning - minor graphic description************************************
When I found him . . . he was everywhere. There was nothing left but puddles of blood, a little gore, and feces. No meat, no bones, no flesh. Just bloody streaks and puddles in the grass where they dragged him for over 20 feet. There were also some small tufts of fur, tiny bits of intestine with feces inside, and some squashed feces that his body had been dragged through.
***********************End Description*********************************************************
The piece of skin that I found before milking was about 150 or 200 feet away from where I found the rest of him. It had been a long time since he had died and been eaten and I couldn't find any footprints or trails because the coyotes or dogs use the same paths the goats use. I couldn't tell what was a goat path and what was used by a coyote. It was just terrible. I'm glad Jocelyne didn't have to go find him though. We moved all the kids back into the dairy and hung a culled turkey out in the pasture where I found his body hoping to attract the killers and shoot them. We never found anything. The turkey is still hanging there. I still hear coyotes every other night (but this time I hear them near the dairy). I've tried to get a LGD certified dog or two on the farm but no one has given me the go-ahead to purchase them. David still hasn't gotten a trap out there either. I don't know what to do.
On another note, I got shocked really badly by the fence the other day as well. Long story short, I was holding the entire roll of poly-wire in both my hands (for good reasons, but best left unexplained) and as Jocelyne was untangling the other end of the wire I got zapped so hard that I almost fell over. If there wasn't a permanent fence behind me I would have been knocked on my butt. I could hear a big bang inside my head an my chest felt like I got kicked by a horse! I was really stunned for several minutes and then continued to be stunned when I realized that I had suffered a large burn on my arm from the shock as well! It was really something and a very fun story to tell at lunchtime =P!
Another big event is the "hoof saga." It began with little Zaria. I noticed him limping around the day after we moved the kids back to the dairy after the coyote attack. I planned to give him a shot of bute (it’s like advil for livestock) because his leg felt a bit hot to me and I thought he might have some sort of sprain. Well, I was feeling for a tender spot and decided to look at his hoof first . . . it was completely gashed from the bottom all the way to the top of his hoof and even around both sides a little and it was very hot (infected). It was also completely covered in poop and mud. At first I didn’t realize how bad his injury was until I got him inside the dairy and rinsed all the poo off. Then I saw that this was really bad. I immediately decided to get some Epsom salts and soak his hoof to get the puss and fluids out of it . . . why I thought of doing this, I don’t know. But it turned out to be exactly what he needed at the time =D pretty cool! I also called Sue Allen who helped advise me as to Jezabelle’s lesion. She said that the Epsom salt soak for 10 minutes twice a day was perfect and since the wound was also hot I needed to give him daily shots of penicillin. She also recommended bandaging the wound and redressing once a day. I called Dr. Hurst as well (our vet) and he said to do the same thing but increase the dosage of penicillin to 1 full cc even though the kid did not weight 100 lbs. Also that I needed to get all the poo out of the wound or it would just get infected again. So I dug around in there with my multi-tool and got all the gunk out. Then soaked and sterilized it with providone iodine two times a day, and kept it bandaged. I was marveling at how much better it looked as I was staring out the window three days later. I was just zoning while thinking about Zaria’s continuing treatment when I noticed another kid limping out in the pasture. I left Zaria and corralled this other kid and saw that she had almost the exact same problem!!!!!!!!! D= Her name is Freya (pronounced, “fray-yah”) and she is Phoebe’s kid. We have very high hopes for her as a new milker next year. I think I caught her injury very quickly because there was very little gunk in the wound. I think both kids caught their soft hooves on some sharp part of the permanent fence. So I did the same things to her as I did to Zaria.
Just yesterday I became very discouraged because their hooves had started looking better and then suddenly filled with puss and became very hot and infected again! D’= I called Dr. Hurst back and asked what I should do now! He said that since I had been soaking the kids hooves for about a week that I should try discontinuing that (because even though I keep everything very clean I might still be getting gunk stuck inside the hoof just because of the tap water, etc) and try using a syringe to squirt the providone iodine into the wound. He also said to try a new antibiotic called LA-200 or Liquamycin intramuscularly.
The day before that Martin, one of the older wethers in the dry goat herd began limping as well! O.o When I felt his legs he had no hoof problems and no wounds, but his front left pastern is very hot and swollen! I isolated him with the other kids with hoof problems and I have been soaking his hoof and giving him penicillin as the advice of Sue Allen. Interestingly, he also has some facial deformities, his right eye is dead and his left eye bugs out pretty far so he has to force his eyelid shut. He certainly is in no pain anymore . . . not even limping! But his pastern is even more swollen and extremely hot to the touch! I’m confused as to what is going on with this guy. He’s a real sweetheart too; another one of Jezabelle’s kids. =)
So this morning I gave all three of them their various treatments and then prepared to give them the new antibiotic Liquamycin. They all needed 4.5 cc and the only syringe I had that went up to 4.5cc was a HUUUUUGE 12cc thing! The needle looked as big as a needle you would use as an IV! So I used the syringe but changed the needle to the kind I usually use. For some reason the Liquamycin was very hard to get out of the vial o_O. I thought it was something to do with the change in needle, but it must just have been the actual medicine itself. I started with Martin and immediately I knew something was wrong. He is always very good about getting shots and barely even flinches when I give him the penicillin intramuscularly. This time I stuck him and he was fine, but when I began pushing the plunger down and injecting the meds Martin started fidgeting. Then he started kicking . . . then he started kicking harder and making sad grunty noises. He kicked so hard that the syringe came out and I had to start again. I cleaned off the other leg because I didn’t want to stick the same leg twice when he showed so much discomfort. I thought maybe I just got the needle in a sensitive spot, but when I stuck him the second time and pushed on the plunger (this type of needle is incredibly difficult to push down on the plunger! I had to push with either my thumb or use both hands!) he did the same thing. I finally got all the medicine in and when I began rubbing the injection site (as instructed) Martin began yelling and kicking again. I let him go back outside right way and made sure he was ok. Then I got ready to give the meds to Zaria.
I was worried about it burning a little but that stuff must hurt like crazy. I stuck Zaria and he flinched, as usual. Then as I pushed down the plunger I got 2.5 cc in him and he just started screaming and flailing. He thrashed around and threw himself off the stanchion screaming like they were his dying breaths. Of course as he kicked the syringe popped out of him and I knew that I had to stick him again to get the rest inside. I rubbed the area to spread the Liquamycin around a little to ease the pain, but he kept kicking and screaming for about 2 minutes. Finally, when he calmed down, I got ready to stick him again. I almost couldn’t do it, but I knew that it was for the best. I shot the rest of it in as quickly as I could (not quickly at all because the plunger is so hard to push down on) and he screamed and thrashed as if his life depended on it. I was getting a bit teary because it was obvious that he was in agony and that I caused it . . . for a good reason, of course, but still it hurt me too. Next was Freya. I didn’t have it in me to cause that much pain to three goats at once. The other day I had been teaching Jennifer to treat the kids with me so it wouldn’t take so long to do their hooves twice a day . . . this training included injections. Jennifer came back in the dairy after dealing with the chickens and I asked Jen to inject Freya while I held her still and tried to distract her. I warned her about what would happen and explained that I just could not do it to another goat today. She soon understood why I couldn’t do it again. Freya did the same thing Zaria did. She began thrashing and screaming bloody murder. The syringe popped out and Jennifer injected her on the other side and finished giving her the medicine while I bopped Freya on the nose over and over again trying to annoy her and distract her. It seemed to work the second time and it became apparent that to inject Liquamycin effectively it requires two people. After treating Freya, Jennifer was really shaken . . . so was I. We were both tearing up. It was really horrible. At least this treatment is only done every third day rather than the penicillin every day. That’s one blessing, I guess.
I was encouraged to see the kids and Martin leaping and frolicking in the pen quite soon after their injection. I actually had to gently scold them for fear that they might reinjure their hooves because they were playing so much! At least the meds did not continue to hurt them after the initial agony. I hope they get better quickly so I don’t have to shoot them again.
So that was today so far. I plan to take it very easy for the rest of the day. Watch a movie, read a book, chill . . . for once =P. Then I’ll give some people a long overdue call and hang out. Jocelyne is leaving for a job at a raw cow dairy in Indiana on Sunday so we all want to spend as much time with her as we can =). We had a farewell party for her and everything. It was very nice. She will be dearly missed, but I know we will keep in touch =).
So that’s my summary . . . pretty long summary, eh? Lol! Next I will post pictures! Stay tuned! B-)
On 11/13/2008 I bred our first doe, Eliza, to Raz! It was . . . awkward =P . . . but successful. Well, we don't really know if it's truly successful until we notice that next month she does not come back into heat. She has been bred in the past, so if this pregnancy does not take it's probably because there's something wrong with Raz. That might be a bit disastrous since he's our only intact male. =/ I think it should be ok though. Since then I've bred Frosty and Triple Teat to him and I'm waiting for someone else to come into heat next. We plan to breed all of the does that are over 1 year old. Kidding season should be very busy with 15 moms kidding around the same time!
This past weekend we had a "progressive tea party" where we had tea and food at each person's home all afternoon. We started at Kristine's place and had tasty potato-spinach pancakes with sauerkraut and some Annis tea. Then we moved to Molly's and had green tea, salsa & chips, black beans, coffee cake. Next was Sarah's place (actually she moved her new couch into the duplex so we would be the "first butts to grace its presence." =P ) where we had champagne or sparkling grape juice, chocolate mousse with raspberries and sour cream, goat cheese torte, and sheep cheese bread sticks =D~. She went nuts! Then we went to my room (I got a new roomie named Jennifer who will be volunteering for 5 weeks) where Jennifer and I had put up Christmas slide show pictures on both our computers, played Celtic Christmas hymns, hung Christmas lights on a small potted tree, bought candy canes, baked chocolate mint-chip cookies, and made hot chocolate. Bethel also made apricot scones. We put a blanket on the floor with some pillows for everyone to sit at. It was a fantastic time! =D
Just before that (I'm not really going in any order here) we had another coyote attack. They got poor Jugs (full name Juggernaut). Of all the kids in the back pasture he was the largest and most healthy . . . it doesn't make sense to me why he would be the one to get picked off. I had to break the news to Jocelyne who nursed this kid back from the brink of death 5 months ago. She put so much time and energy into saving him and he was a beautiful goat. The milkers noticed that there was a goat missing but did not look for any signs of him. I was very frustrated with them because as soon as you notice a goat is missing you MUST look for them IMMEDIATELY for myriad reasons. To me that is common sense, but I guess it's not to everyone else. By the time I was told a goat had been missing it was already dark. I went out looking anyway but I couldn't find anything. The next morning I went to look right before milking. I found a hunk of torn skin and I knew that he was dead and not just lost. After milking I went back and searched for his body.
************************Warning - minor graphic description************************************
When I found him . . . he was everywhere. There was nothing left but puddles of blood, a little gore, and feces. No meat, no bones, no flesh. Just bloody streaks and puddles in the grass where they dragged him for over 20 feet. There were also some small tufts of fur, tiny bits of intestine with feces inside, and some squashed feces that his body had been dragged through.
***********************End Description*********************************************************
The piece of skin that I found before milking was about 150 or 200 feet away from where I found the rest of him. It had been a long time since he had died and been eaten and I couldn't find any footprints or trails because the coyotes or dogs use the same paths the goats use. I couldn't tell what was a goat path and what was used by a coyote. It was just terrible. I'm glad Jocelyne didn't have to go find him though. We moved all the kids back into the dairy and hung a culled turkey out in the pasture where I found his body hoping to attract the killers and shoot them. We never found anything. The turkey is still hanging there. I still hear coyotes every other night (but this time I hear them near the dairy). I've tried to get a LGD certified dog or two on the farm but no one has given me the go-ahead to purchase them. David still hasn't gotten a trap out there either. I don't know what to do.
On another note, I got shocked really badly by the fence the other day as well. Long story short, I was holding the entire roll of poly-wire in both my hands (for good reasons, but best left unexplained) and as Jocelyne was untangling the other end of the wire I got zapped so hard that I almost fell over. If there wasn't a permanent fence behind me I would have been knocked on my butt. I could hear a big bang inside my head an my chest felt like I got kicked by a horse! I was really stunned for several minutes and then continued to be stunned when I realized that I had suffered a large burn on my arm from the shock as well! It was really something and a very fun story to tell at lunchtime =P!
Another big event is the "hoof saga." It began with little Zaria. I noticed him limping around the day after we moved the kids back to the dairy after the coyote attack. I planned to give him a shot of bute (it’s like advil for livestock) because his leg felt a bit hot to me and I thought he might have some sort of sprain. Well, I was feeling for a tender spot and decided to look at his hoof first . . . it was completely gashed from the bottom all the way to the top of his hoof and even around both sides a little and it was very hot (infected). It was also completely covered in poop and mud. At first I didn’t realize how bad his injury was until I got him inside the dairy and rinsed all the poo off. Then I saw that this was really bad. I immediately decided to get some Epsom salts and soak his hoof to get the puss and fluids out of it . . . why I thought of doing this, I don’t know. But it turned out to be exactly what he needed at the time =D pretty cool! I also called Sue Allen who helped advise me as to Jezabelle’s lesion. She said that the Epsom salt soak for 10 minutes twice a day was perfect and since the wound was also hot I needed to give him daily shots of penicillin. She also recommended bandaging the wound and redressing once a day. I called Dr. Hurst as well (our vet) and he said to do the same thing but increase the dosage of penicillin to 1 full cc even though the kid did not weight 100 lbs. Also that I needed to get all the poo out of the wound or it would just get infected again. So I dug around in there with my multi-tool and got all the gunk out. Then soaked and sterilized it with providone iodine two times a day, and kept it bandaged. I was marveling at how much better it looked as I was staring out the window three days later. I was just zoning while thinking about Zaria’s continuing treatment when I noticed another kid limping out in the pasture. I left Zaria and corralled this other kid and saw that she had almost the exact same problem!!!!!!!!! D= Her name is Freya (pronounced, “fray-yah”) and she is Phoebe’s kid. We have very high hopes for her as a new milker next year. I think I caught her injury very quickly because there was very little gunk in the wound. I think both kids caught their soft hooves on some sharp part of the permanent fence. So I did the same things to her as I did to Zaria.
Just yesterday I became very discouraged because their hooves had started looking better and then suddenly filled with puss and became very hot and infected again! D’= I called Dr. Hurst back and asked what I should do now! He said that since I had been soaking the kids hooves for about a week that I should try discontinuing that (because even though I keep everything very clean I might still be getting gunk stuck inside the hoof just because of the tap water, etc) and try using a syringe to squirt the providone iodine into the wound. He also said to try a new antibiotic called LA-200 or Liquamycin intramuscularly.
The day before that Martin, one of the older wethers in the dry goat herd began limping as well! O.o When I felt his legs he had no hoof problems and no wounds, but his front left pastern is very hot and swollen! I isolated him with the other kids with hoof problems and I have been soaking his hoof and giving him penicillin as the advice of Sue Allen. Interestingly, he also has some facial deformities, his right eye is dead and his left eye bugs out pretty far so he has to force his eyelid shut. He certainly is in no pain anymore . . . not even limping! But his pastern is even more swollen and extremely hot to the touch! I’m confused as to what is going on with this guy. He’s a real sweetheart too; another one of Jezabelle’s kids. =)
So this morning I gave all three of them their various treatments and then prepared to give them the new antibiotic Liquamycin. They all needed 4.5 cc and the only syringe I had that went up to 4.5cc was a HUUUUUGE 12cc thing! The needle looked as big as a needle you would use as an IV! So I used the syringe but changed the needle to the kind I usually use. For some reason the Liquamycin was very hard to get out of the vial o_O. I thought it was something to do with the change in needle, but it must just have been the actual medicine itself. I started with Martin and immediately I knew something was wrong. He is always very good about getting shots and barely even flinches when I give him the penicillin intramuscularly. This time I stuck him and he was fine, but when I began pushing the plunger down and injecting the meds Martin started fidgeting. Then he started kicking . . . then he started kicking harder and making sad grunty noises. He kicked so hard that the syringe came out and I had to start again. I cleaned off the other leg because I didn’t want to stick the same leg twice when he showed so much discomfort. I thought maybe I just got the needle in a sensitive spot, but when I stuck him the second time and pushed on the plunger (this type of needle is incredibly difficult to push down on the plunger! I had to push with either my thumb or use both hands!) he did the same thing. I finally got all the medicine in and when I began rubbing the injection site (as instructed) Martin began yelling and kicking again. I let him go back outside right way and made sure he was ok. Then I got ready to give the meds to Zaria.
I was worried about it burning a little but that stuff must hurt like crazy. I stuck Zaria and he flinched, as usual. Then as I pushed down the plunger I got 2.5 cc in him and he just started screaming and flailing. He thrashed around and threw himself off the stanchion screaming like they were his dying breaths. Of course as he kicked the syringe popped out of him and I knew that I had to stick him again to get the rest inside. I rubbed the area to spread the Liquamycin around a little to ease the pain, but he kept kicking and screaming for about 2 minutes. Finally, when he calmed down, I got ready to stick him again. I almost couldn’t do it, but I knew that it was for the best. I shot the rest of it in as quickly as I could (not quickly at all because the plunger is so hard to push down on) and he screamed and thrashed as if his life depended on it. I was getting a bit teary because it was obvious that he was in agony and that I caused it . . . for a good reason, of course, but still it hurt me too. Next was Freya. I didn’t have it in me to cause that much pain to three goats at once. The other day I had been teaching Jennifer to treat the kids with me so it wouldn’t take so long to do their hooves twice a day . . . this training included injections. Jennifer came back in the dairy after dealing with the chickens and I asked Jen to inject Freya while I held her still and tried to distract her. I warned her about what would happen and explained that I just could not do it to another goat today. She soon understood why I couldn’t do it again. Freya did the same thing Zaria did. She began thrashing and screaming bloody murder. The syringe popped out and Jennifer injected her on the other side and finished giving her the medicine while I bopped Freya on the nose over and over again trying to annoy her and distract her. It seemed to work the second time and it became apparent that to inject Liquamycin effectively it requires two people. After treating Freya, Jennifer was really shaken . . . so was I. We were both tearing up. It was really horrible. At least this treatment is only done every third day rather than the penicillin every day. That’s one blessing, I guess.
I was encouraged to see the kids and Martin leaping and frolicking in the pen quite soon after their injection. I actually had to gently scold them for fear that they might reinjure their hooves because they were playing so much! At least the meds did not continue to hurt them after the initial agony. I hope they get better quickly so I don’t have to shoot them again.
So that was today so far. I plan to take it very easy for the rest of the day. Watch a movie, read a book, chill . . . for once =P. Then I’ll give some people a long overdue call and hang out. Jocelyne is leaving for a job at a raw cow dairy in Indiana on Sunday so we all want to spend as much time with her as we can =). We had a farewell party for her and everything. It was very nice. She will be dearly missed, but I know we will keep in touch =).
So that’s my summary . . . pretty long summary, eh? Lol! Next I will post pictures! Stay tuned! B-)