# Cannot get goats to gain weight



## 382664 (May 26, 2017)

i bought 3 Nubians a couple of weeks ago, I didn't notice how bad of shape they were in when I put the deposit down for them. 2 are 1 year olds and small and 1 is a baby who I am bottle feeding. The baby is doing fine and in seemly good condition BTW. The 2 year olds were extremely skinny with not a lot of muscle on them. Just bones and skins with large stomachs. I brought them home and dewormed them and put them on fresh grass, some grain mix for goats and sheep my local feed store makes, and some mineral mix. I have been trying to get them into condition and they have been dewormed twice now. They have good spirits but just look so worn down, dull hair, bones are sticking out and in the smaller of the two yearlings her stomach is very large still and has clumpy poop. My Nigerians are all in amazing shape, great coats, nice muscle to bone ratio. 


Do I just need to keep deworming? When can I expect results for the two poor girls. It's strange because the people I bought them from gave me a sheet of paper of what to feed them. Yes I am new to goats but my goats I have look better then the ones I bought from them. I also try to give them natural fresh foods and a lot of grazing on fresh grass and they seem to love pincherry leaves. Everyone else in my herd is doing very well just these two girls, and they don't have an appetite like my Nigerians... I would expect them to be eating more, but the only thing they want is grain.


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## Goat and Chixken Lady (Mar 17, 2017)

You might need to see if they have coccidia. Or they may need Copper or Selenium. I'm fairly new to goats myself (2 years in) and I have found that every time my goats aren't "right" it is due to a huge worm load, coccidia, and I just recently learned about how Copper and selenium can affect their coats, retention of nutrients, and worm loads. Check these 2 sites, they are a wealth of information. 

TennesseeMeatGoats.com
Fiascofarms.com


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## moonspinner (Jul 2, 2002)

First off, what dewormer did you use? Did you get a fecal done? It could be you need a specific class of wormer for which type of parasite. Or might be cocci overload. How are their eyelids?
I can testify to the need for copper bolusing. My goats always look better afterwards. And yes, they might need a BoSe too.
I would not load up on grain until you get to the source of their emaciation. And some Fortified B can never go wrong and it can stimulate appetite.


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## Caprice Acres (Mar 6, 2005)

Goats are ruminants. Big stomachs are GOOD! That means they're happily fermenting away a large amount of fiber which is the healthiest state a rumen can be. In my important links sticky at the top of the forum, you should be able to find resources to body condition score your animals. This will give a hopefully more objective way to evaluate the body weight of your animals

Secondly, nubians are a dairy breed. Not only will they be more 'angular' and naturally 'skinny' looking than say a meat breed, but they have a job to do. They are meant to make milk, and lactation is the most demanding life stage of any animal - far more than growth or pregnancy. This means lactating animals especially earlier in lactation will lose weight. The goal through good health and nutrition is to gain it slowly through late lactation/early gestation and the dry period so that they are at an ideal body weight by the following year's kidding season. How much weight loss you may see is largely dependent on parasites, nutrition, production status etc. So, to some degree it's normal but excessive loss warrants attention and support. 

My alpines always look like yetis in the spring before I clip them - their old hair is aged and damaged and ready to be shed for the season. Sun can damage hair as can common goat behaviors such as itching on fencing or fenceposts, causing the ugly haircoats. This is normal to some degree. Of course, parasitism, poor nutrition, and copper deficiencies can all cause some hair defects. I encourage folks to evaluate the haircoat by parting the hair and looking at the hair shaft and the skin underneath. Nothing that is going on internally can make an animals' hair change in texture or quality once it has erupted from the skin, so examining the skin and hair near the root can give you a better idea if it's actually a hair creation problem OR if it is mechanical or sun damage as is common especially this time of year.

Knowing what you dewormed with, at what dose is very important. Dewormers shouldn't be used willy nilly and appropriate use and dosing is best. Again, there are links in the stickied post above for more information.

Weight gain should never be expected to be rapid. Being ruminants, maintaining gut health is important. A high quality forage (hay, pasture, or both) is ideal, and you can choose to add a small ration of grain if needed. ONGOING control of parasites is important. I personally don't worry about coccidia causing clinical illness in adults, but it is especially a concern with growing stock which may never show signs of diarrhea and instead, may just be SEVERELY stunted due to an infection. Tapeworms also are not the cause of any serious illness but are icky and most choose to treat. Your young stock MAY become clinically infected from tapes as well, but even that is somewhat debated as to how pathogenic they are. Most are self-cured with time. The drugs used to control coccidia, tapes, and stomach worms are generally different so knowing proper doses and routes and drugs is important. It's not necessarily similar between species or even correct on label dosages due to resistance issues.


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## moonspinner (Jul 2, 2002)

Also, Probiotics/yogurt I've found to be very beneficial, particularly IF the goats' big stomachs are due to bloat. And yes, I agree my goats tend to look their worst in spring and by mid summer they are glowing.


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## 382664 (May 26, 2017)

I let my goats pasture graze, I give them mineral support and did two dewormings of ivermectin. One goat in particular has a very large stomach compared to her body. I just bought another goat the day before yesterday and he is in beautiful shape! I put pictures although the problem goats are the brown ones and they are farther away it's hard to see their condition. But when I picked up my buck the other day I seen the condition of the nubians the woman I bought from and they were in beautiful condition! Nice healthy bodies and coats. It worried me even more, I am a little upset about the condition of the does, and I don't know how people could just let them get that way. The people I bought them from said they give herbal dewormer, and frankly I do not think that works very well. The goats are very friendly and trained to walk on leash but wow their condition is just skin and bone. They look nothing like other nubians I have seen.


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## 382664 (May 26, 2017)

This is the picture of the male nubian I bought.


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## RiverPines (Dec 12, 2006)

The feed you said is for goats and sheep. That's a mistake. Goats need high copper and anything that's ok for sheep won't have copper in it. To little copper cause rough costs and a run down look. 
They need feed for goats and lose minerals for goats. 
Dairy breeds are also lean looking. The big belly is good.


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## [email protected] (Sep 16, 2009)

someone mentioned eyelids. but they did not elaborate.
carefully take a Q-tip and roll an eye lid over it so that the inside of the lid is visible. If it is pinkish, they are not usually wormy. If the lid looks white, then treat for worms.

way back in the olden days, I fed my goats raw tobacco. I bought the cheapest brand of string tobacco and gave each goat a couple of ounces of it every once in awhile. No worm problems .
and they loved the tobacco. 
..my neighbor used to just flick his leftover cigarette butts to his goats. (unlit of course).

I also mixed a little molasses with the grain. I fed only whole oats. lots of nutrients in molasses.

.......jiminwisc.......


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## Caprice Acres (Mar 6, 2005)

A q-tip is not necessary, may be damaging to eye tissues especially if the animal thrashes and responds as a normal animal will to both visual and physical stimulation near the eye. But I agree, it is a GREAT idea to explain how to evaluate the eye membranes! The FAMANCHA score is easily assessed by depressing the eye gently from the top lid, while gently pulling down on the bottom lid. The slight pressure on the eye will evert the conjunctiva for easy assessment. There are likely youtube videos and information available in a million places online. Here are a few pics: 



















The use of tobacco is not suggested. There are far too many variables at play to definitively say that tobacco helps. Those that anecdotally claim it works may have other factors that help to also reduce parasite load but tobacco gets all the fame. Tobacco contains nicotine and it paralyzes (not necessarily kills) parasites, BUT it has a much narrower range of safety for the animals. Paralysis may not result in death of the parasite and while it may allow time for motility to assist in the removal of the parasites, it may be less effective for some types - stomach worms that just sink to the bottom of the stomachs or that are attached to the abomasum wall. Intestinal parasites may be evacuated more effectively except tapeworms which have very efficient sucker attachments that may allow them to hold on. Then there is the natural variability of tobacco and the levels of nicotine. There is no way to accurately dose animals without risking overdose or underdose. There are many other great options that have proven efficacy and safety at normal dosages. There are even some pasture plants that are proven to help as part of a parasite control program that are far safer than tobacco. 

Deciding to deworm should rarely be done for one reason alone due to the sensitivity of each thing we look at. Many animals with heavy worm burdens have normal or semi-normal feces - but diarrhea is a common finding in animals with heavy loads or greatly affected by parasites. Anemia is also very useful, but really only tells you about the blood sucking or blood loss parasites such as Haemonchus contortus (barberpole) or coccidiosis (young animals, generally). Fecal egg counts or evaluations may very well tell you lots of eggs which usually means lots of adults. It also tells you what type of parasites you're dealing with and give you a better idea of what to treat with. However, if animals have recently been infected with a large load and have juvenile parasites, the juveniles are not mature and not shedding eggs but still be in great enough numbers to cause anemia and clinical signs. 

The appropriate use of dewormers is VERY important. Inappropriate deworming procedures can RAPIDLY cause dewormer resistance in your parasites - with even the best drugs. Parasites won't go away and the approval rate for new dewormers is extremely slow. Inappropriate deworming methods such as deworming whole herds, deworming animals that aren't showing appropriate reasons for dewormer (weight loss, diarrhea, large numbers of eggs on fecal, anemia etc), or excessive deworming when there is no refugia are all poor practices proven to increase rates of resistance. Combining poor dewormer practices accelerates this process. Pasture management is extremely important, as well as environmental contamination/cleanliness. Kids are many times more susceptible to parasites and so your kid raising protocols can also play a huge role in your losses to parasites. Other countries like New Zealand and Australia are also having good luck with combination dewormer use which is helpful in combating resistance as well. 

There are MANY good resources for parasite control in my informational links sticky above, but for rapid access, the wormx.info website is a definitive resource for parasite management. It is ran by the American Consortium for Small Ruminant Parasite Control consisting of many small ruminant professionals both veterinary and in the animal science fields that are concerned about the extreme problem of dewormer resistance in small ruminants. There are lots of good articles on many subjects there, it's well worth a visit (or several - I learn gobs more each time I go!)


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## 382664 (May 26, 2017)

I do supplement with goat minerals as well as the feed, but my goats pasture graze and I think that is the most natural thing for them and the best thing for them. They shouldn't need as much supplements as they have varieties of things to eat as well as leaves and buds on trees. The four Nigerians that I had bought a couple of months ago weren't in top shape but were better then these Nubians I bought.. they had balding hair and a lot of dry skin and they were raised on hay and goat feed. A month on raw pasture and their costs started to shine, they had less bloated bellies, the hair had gotten thicker and dry skin went away. I will just be patient with my nubians and see if they just take a little longer to get condition through eating fresh pasture herbs grass and other things. They just look worlds different then the other wonderful nubians I see. Poor things.


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## 382664 (May 26, 2017)

Thank you everyone for all of the wonderful information, I appreciate it highly. I am new to goats but I am not new to raising animals. And I believe natural is the best. Although this venture makes me skeptical about herbal dewormers now as the people I bought the nubians from gave the goats an herbal blend for getting rid of worms, and it obviously didn't work well as they are in such bad condition. I know dairy goats are more lean, but I have seen other nubians up close and personal and they were not emaciated like the ones I bought. They were healthy animals that had good bone to muscle ratio and beautiful healthy coats.


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## Caprice Acres (Mar 6, 2005)

Pasture is all well and great but keep in mind that owning livestock is not a 'natural' phenomenon. Fences aren't a thing in nature and inherently restrict an animal to one area to forage and also where they contaminate it to a high degree with parasites. Overgrazing can cause rapid significant change in availability of plant species for foraging and also causes them to usually 'graze down' instead of 'browse up' which would inherently help them prevent parasites. Goats will eliminate their 'favorite' plants from a pasture quite quickly if not rotated and decrease variety very efficiently. What we see out in pasture is NOT indicative of what they're eating, and their eating patterns has a lot to do with what tastes good, How much and what actually is available, what doesn't taste poisonous, and where they've had to defecate. (instinctually, herbivores do not eat where there is poo if they can help it) We also don't usually have a direct financial (and sometimes emotional) investment in wild animals like we do livestock. We have also bred livestock to far outperform wild animals so that they are useful. So expecting to not have to put in as much input as is 'natural' is unrealistic moving forward with livestock. Sure, that doesn't mean you must CATER to them if they fail to thrive with adequate care, but it does mean that you will need to expect to do MORE than what a 'wild' animal would need if that makes any sense.

Even though your pastures may *look* good to YOU, it is very likely a wide range of things are playing a role in it's nutritional value that are hard to or impossible to spot. Changing seasons and weather patterns can make some plants more nutritional or more toxic, for example. A pasture in spring can support many more animals than more mature pastures in August or during a drought. These same springtime rich pastures predispose animals to grass tetany, however. The same pastures go through a lot of change year to year and thus the number of animals they can support can also change. Your pasture management plays a large role - seeding pastures with good forage plants that regrow or even help reduce parasites as well as pasture rotation increase pasture health and diversity can benefit a LOT. Age of the plants changes their nutritional content drastically as well, decreasing available nutrients for the amount of 'bulk' they're receiving. As options decrease during overgrazing, animals may choose to start eating toxic plants because there aren't any other options and thus you will often see toxicities in times of drought or overgrazing. (again, to human owers, it can be hard to SEE overgrazing as these pastures may still look like there is 'something to eat out there') Some pastures may not support a good lactation due to nutritional requirements of lactation being very high, as well as lactating animals requiring a very high calcium intake to avoid milk fever or failure of lactation.

Just some thoughts to ponder moving forward. Likely not a big deal if you're thinking of using them as pets only, but if you plan on milking or using them as utility animals at all, you may be dissapointed with the outcome.


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## VA Susan (Mar 2, 2010)

barbaralee said:


> Thank you everyone for all of the wonderful information, I appreciate it highly. I am new to goats but I am not new to raising animals. And I believe natural is the best. Although this venture makes me skeptical about herbal dewormers now as the people I bought the nubians from gave the goats an herbal blend for getting rid of worms, and it obviously didn't work well as they are in such bad condition. I know dairy goats are more lean, but I have seen other nubians up close and personal and they were not emaciated like the ones I bought. They were healthy animals that had good bone to muscle ratio and beautiful healthy coats.


Call your vets in the area and see how much a fecal costs. That way you know what you are dealing with. The barber pole worm is resistant to many De wormers. We bought a little buckling a few years ago who was de-wormed with cydectin when we bought him. He was scouring badly when we got him home. I took samples in for our girls and took one for him too in case he had some worms not covered by the cydectin. He was LOADED with stomach worms and also had coccidiosis. It took us months to control his worms, trying many different de-wormers. I contacted his previous owners and they had started using Prohibit and it is the only thing we've used that has been effective. We do regular fecals and only use the de-wormers when they have a high worm count. It was only 7 dollars to get a fecal done but our vet is over an hour away from us. Another vet wanted 25 dollars/test! I bought a second hand highscool microscope on eBay this year so I can do my own now. I used to work for a vet and did fecals for cats and dogs. There is good information online about how to do your own testing.


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## odieclark (May 11, 2016)

What great advice on here, it is a lot to take in! Dona, you do a fabulous job explaining all of this, and even though I have read some of this before, am new to assisting with the animal health care as well, and newer to goats as well. A complicated creature, with high energy and needs! A very fast metabolism, that is challenging to keep going! 

Worms keep weights down, lack of minerals, ....etc...


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## EmyJ (Aug 3, 2017)

Congrats for the triplets!!!! If you find the mom expert on triplets, just enjoy watching them else check if mom takes care of all the three and doesn't kick or butt one away.
Feed them warm molasses water and give her all that she needs.


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## odieclark (May 11, 2016)

Thank you! Warm milk-kids have been averse to the bottles! Ugh!

Kicking one off-heard of that but not so far

Now giving rumen bolus to stimulate moms rumen and hoping that helps kick in milk production!


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## greenTgoats (Jul 1, 2017)

You really need to get fecals done.


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## Caprice Acres (Mar 6, 2005)

Mid America Ag Research does fecals for much less than most vets will charge. I believe they increased the price to 6.00 per sample. Still dirt cheap.


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## odieclark (May 11, 2016)

Wow! That is cheap! Fecals are definitely a go to mot times! We did drench the doe 24 hours after birthing and honestly 'think' she is ok. It seems she is just struggling with 3 and this is her first kidding. She is likely about 3 years old and is about average compared to all our adults goats. 

Two of the 3 were down early on, got them feeding on mom again and seemed ok... now it seems 2 of 3 are pretty good, but it again seems like we are losing the one. Failing to gain weight, took temp and fine, giving B12,


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## odieclark (May 11, 2016)

Check out the kids reaction to some treats/clippings brought in! The favorite by their mommas was the raspberry branch clippings, so far!


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## greenTgoats (Jul 1, 2017)

They are so freaking adorable


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## odieclark (May 11, 2016)

Aww, thanks! I know-wish I knew someone who wanted to adopt some of them! Still working on that!

Ugh, my new issue-looks like we have an egg bound hen---ugh..what next?!?


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