Their Forever Farm

You know, it seems like every time I talk about something with the goats, it’s how the copper deficiency has impacted it.  Today is no different.  Milk–the copper deficiency impacts their production.  I’ve also noticed in the last few years that I just can’t keep them in milk.  They dry up well before I’m ready for them to.

Haley

I used to milk until it got too cold in the open chicken building or the first of February when I had to let them dry up to make colostrum for the next year’s kids.

Millie’s udder

This year I’ve already had two completely dry up on me and Zinnia is drying up quickly.  I’m sure getting the copper back in their systems will fix it, but I don’t know how many years it will take.

Zinnia

That means, I had to let the woman who had planned on taking Aphrodite and Hera know that she wouldn’t be able to milk them the way she wanted.

Aphrodite

Hera

That also means that they are now just staying here.

As long as Hera will decide to let me touch her again.

She hasn’t let me touch her since I had to put the horn apparatus back on her.

White = 5

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.

 

Source and more information

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.

Merry Christmas

Some ghosts of Christmas past and one of Christmas present.

Millie

Marley

MJ

Bob

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas.