The one thing left from the copper deficiency that I see in the herd that is still concerning is the anemia. If you’ve ever heard of the famacha chart, it is a way of looking at the membranes of a goat’s eyes and assigning a number based on color. Bright red, normal eye membranes are given a one. As they lose color, they go all the way to the number five, which is white.
I’ve never given a lot of stock to the famacha chart as a way of determining parasite load.
normal and anemic
Part of that is experience. Millie was sick one time, and the vet came and checked her eyes, but they looked fine. There was no recommendation to do a fecal or worm her. The next day, she exploded in diarrhea and I took a fecal sample over, which showed she had lots of worms.
Millie Ann Saanen
Another time, Millie was horribly anemic. They did a fecal that came back clean–not just a few, but completely clean. They checked her blood, and no illness was found other than anemia. I did manage to get her to recover, but I never knew why she had the condition. Now I know.
Copper deficiency causes anemia. On April 30th, the vet saw Vixen because her eye membranes were white. I she was weak. I had no idea what to do with her because she’d been wormed and I had nothing else I could do. The vet recommended we wait for a bit. It wasn’t long after that we discovered the copper issues and gave the bolus to her (and everyone else). A couple of weeks later, I could see the faintest hint of pink in her eyes. Now she’s still pale, but it’s better.
Vixen
Several of my older goats are still pale but improving. Then there’s Dolly.
Dolly Ann Street
She is also pure white despite having had the copper bolus because she is my oldest girl who had kids and raised twins. That causes a lot of stress on the body. That’s also why I weaned her boys.
Pluto and Anubis
They are doing fine. They have green stuff and lots of friends to play with.
Harley, Antigone (behind), Enkidu, Gilgamesh, Horus, Eve, Pluto, and Anubis (back)
Now I’m hoping Dolly will just quit making milk. Can you see all that milk in there? She was using the copper to take care of her babies. I did milk her once and got a quart, so she was making a half a gallon a day. Then I remembered I was already giving her extra feed, so milking her didn’t help her gain anything. It kills me not to be milking her, but it’s what she needs.
Now she needs to focus on herself.
She’s very much in critical condition, but I’m hoping weaning the boys and shutting her in with a diet that his much higher in copper will help her.
If she’s still here but not getting even a hint of pink in a couple of weeks, I’ll add part of another bolus to see if that helps.
Teresa
