Posted by Linda F on April 17, 2002 at 16:31:56:
In Reply to: Re: Update but far from out of the woods!!!!!!!!!! posted by Helene on April 17, 2002 at 15:35:47:
Hi Gloria sounds like you're going through the same thing I have been going through for the past week. We raise fullblood boers and percentages and one of my fullbloods went down on last Wed. Started her propylene glycol immediately. She looked huge with kids, I called the vet and talk to him for awhile he was saying pregnancy toxemia, and I was saying milk fever either way we reached an agreement between the both of us and decided to put her on calium suppliments as well as propylene glycol and give 4 cc of LA200 SQ and also gave her Pred F SQ. By 10:00 that evening she was not doing well at all her temp spiked and she began to bloat I called the vet and he said he wanted to come out and check her beings that he was still at the office. So he came out and we tubed her and releived her bloat he also gave her some TheraBloat. He did comment that she was very large and that if she didn't get better it would be advisable to induce her to try to save her even though she was 2 1/2 weeks from kidding. We drenched her 3-4 X a day with propylene glycol 30cc and Calciovet 30 cc for the calcium. Getting her up and forcing her to stand and walk 5-6 X a day if left to lay around her leg joints can get ankloose and freeze in that permanent position and with no calcium, you have no muscle tone.Our doe on Fri aborted 4 kids we tried to save them but they were to premature. It is now 1 week later and she is now getting up on her own and walking small distances. She still really struggles to get up but at least she is getting stronger. I have learned alot from this situation the first is that I don't have to grain my goats unless they are getting milked like a dairy goat which they are not. I had all of my goats way over conditioned (fat) and in most of these cases it will be a heavey doe that will go down or show signs. Second I have one more doe to kid out and when they are weaned thay all go to a grass hay except for the kids of course will have alfalfa and feedin. When they are bred again in the fall I will feed grasss hay until they are 100 days into gestation then gradually switch to alfalfa. No matter how you look at it Ketosis/ milk fever is a management issue and beleive me that was a tough pill to swallow. Karen and the other posts gave some real good advise on tubing but a calf tube is still too big according to my vet a colt tube or just the tube off of our drench gun is what we used. If she is not drinking or eating she should be getting tubed we used Merricks Winners Choice Electrolytes too and tubed her with this. It also has calcium and vitamins in it as well as the bacteria in it to keep her rumen functioning. If you need someone to show you how the first time find someone, just make sure you mark the tube before you tube her from her mouth to her rumen that way you know you have'nt gone too far. You can also tell if you have it in the lung or not by simply placing the tube in the water pail if it sucks water as she breaths then gentley remove it and try again, sometimes it take a few tries.Most important thing is to not let her bite the tube off or you will have problems Our doe also retained some of the placenta so we are giving her heavy doses of penecillin 9 cc 2X a day to keep her from getting toxic. If she is nursing as stated by another post by someone I would take the kids off and bottle feed them to let her get her strength back. Sorry this is so long! I'm not saying you have to give her what we give her but with her not eating and not drinking it can become worse. Good luck and I hope for the best.