Hobby Farm Animals by Sue Weaver & McLaughlin

Author:Sue Weaver & McLaughlin [Weaver, Hansen, Langlois, McFarlen, PhD & McLaughlin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lumina Media
Published: 2015-11-30T05:00:00+00:00

Goat Health, Maladies, and Hooves

Goats are prone to a host of serious ailments, and that’s a fact. However, it’s just as true that properly managed goats rarely get sick.

We’ve said it before, but we’ll say it again: don’t buy trouble! Choose healthy foundation stock and take basic steps to watch over the health of your charges. Certain problems will still be inevitable, but it’s easy to avoid major nasties such as foot rot; caprine arthritis encephalitis (CAE); caseous lymphadenitis (CLA); contagious ecthyma (CE), also called sore mouth and orf; and Johne’s disease by buying from disease-free herds. At the very least, avoid purchases from livestock auctions or poorly managed herds.

Once you have purchased your goats, you should have relatively few health concerns to contend with if you feed and handle your goats properly, worm them when needed, vaccinate according to your vet’s recommendations, monitor their health every day, and don’t allow them contact with anyone else’s goats or sheep.

Anytime you take your goats where other goats or sheep are present, you’re exposing them to a host of communicable diseases. If the risk is necessary or unavoidable, at least hedge your bets against introducing sickness into your herd by quarantining incoming goats—whether newly purchased or home from an outing—for at least three weeks. To prevent accidental contamination, don’t feed and handle quarantined goats until after you’ve tended to your main herd, and don’t let visitors, pets, or poultry move freely between your quarantine area and your primary goat housing.

It’s important to recognize illnesses and start treatment right away, so you’ll have to learn to tell when a goat is feeling out of sorts. Stroll among your goats at least twice a day, watching for signs of illness, and remove suspect individuals to your quarantine area without delay. If only one goat is ailing, reduce the sick goat’s stress by moving a second goat to the quarantine area and penning it a distance from, but within sight of, the sick goat.

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