It's been a very rough month! My Doe, Pims, who kidded with beautiful twin does on February 2nd got sick! Here's what happened. She was producing very well...about 2.5 lbs per milking of colostrum. She was beginning to produce more at around 6 lbs per day, when she had a sudden drop in production. It was super cold so I didn't think much of it. The next day I realized that she was scouring badly and had no appetite.
I went into high gear. I had two hungry kids and not enough milk and a doe that could die! I started with Corrid, doused down her throat with a turkey baster. I used 2 tsp in water enough to fill the baster and put it down her throat, behind her tongue (this is a 2 person job). You have to run it down slowly so she doesn't choke. I also treated the water with Corrid. It tastes bad enough that they wouldn't drink the water and I saw no change by evening so I switched to Sulmet. Again, a dose down the throat with a turkey baster and sulmet in the water with some goat electrolytes to help mask the smell and to give her back some of what the diarrhoea was taking.
I followed the following regimen for a week. Sulmet in the morning and in the water with electrolyte, almost no feed (1/2 of a 16 oz can of rolled oats and cheerios twice daily--she only picked at it anyway) at milking time. Her udder went through changes and her milk production dropped to 1.7 lbs per milking. The udder became leathery like when a doe is being dried up. At night she got pro-biotics and no sulmet in the water.
By the third day of this, her stools were firm. By the weeks end, her udder was pink again, as if she had just kidded and she was producing 2.25 lbs of milk twice a day...almost enough for the kids but not nearly what you would expect of a two year old doe. For the kids I started adding milk re-placer to their bottles on top of the milk to get them used to it. You don't want to switch to milk re-placer all at once because they will get sick (as my husband found out when he got up and thought he was doing a good thing by making a straight milk re-placer bottle. The baby scoured but recovered quickly when she got her mother's milk and probiotics). I used the "Save a Kid" brand milk re-placer and it worked very well.
Pims is now a month out from her first episode with scours. She has gone through mini-episodes since then of not eating and having loose stools but she continues to get better. She is eating two 16 oz cans of goat grain (Blue Seal Caprine Challenger) twice a day and is producing 5 lbs per day of milk, which is pretty poor. She may never recover from the damage that was done to her gut and it may always affect her production but I am waiting to see what spring and fresh grass and warm temperatures do for her before I make any judgement.
It's been a tough road but on the positive side, at eight weeks this Saturday, both kids are doing great. They have exceeded their weaning weight already even though I am still feeding bottles--20 oz, twice daily of their mother's milk and 20 oz of water with molasses twice daily. They are eating kid grain (it's hard to tell how much because they spill quite a lot) and hay. They are both well over 30 lbs and growing fast. Pims has contributed three does to the herd in her two years and more than earned her way. I hope she will recover but if she doesn't, only a wonderful pet home will do for her...or she stays with us. She won't be culled.
