Newborn Goat First Aid
Like 1 Dislike 0 Published on 11 Jan 2010
A video of 2 saved goats kids.
After 5 years raising goats, I thought we should share a couple secrets in keeping newborns alive where newbies tend to lose them:
1) Someone really needs to be there when they're born to ensure the kids are strong enough to get up and suckle the doe. Even when they do that, you want to be sure there is milk and cholostrum coming out of the nanny. The mother's milk is the single most important medicine and food there is.
2) IN THE FIRST 6 - 12 HOURS, IF YOU DON'T GET CHOLOSTRUM AND MILK INTO THE KID, BABY BEGINS TO RAPIDLY DIE. Hypothermia / Hypoglycemia and entry into low glucose coma and death is the outcome. At this point, most ranchers -- if they recognize the problem -- begin to tube feed the kids and that will work for about 90% of such cases. However, in our experience, that 10% or so which are really bad off will tend to be pushed over the edge if you do tube or bottle feed them.
3) Around the time the suckle response is mostly lost and the kid is quasi-comatose -- or at any time the kid appears floppy and lifeless -- we DO NOT move immediately for tube feeding. Why not? Because a meal will tend to step up Insulin production which drops the glucose all the more for awhile until digestion and metabolism takes place. About 10% of the quasi-comatose cases you'll push into a deeper state and death before the blood glucose comes up. Therefore, bring the blood glucose up first for a time and then tube feed! This has been the subject of an excellent report on tending to hypothermia in lambs in Canada: http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/livestock/sheep/facts/98-089.htm
Low blood glucose = lower body temperature. You'll feel a loss of vital heat around the face, cheeks, and neck -- a general coldness compared to strong kids (even in summer!).
4) The Canadian report has formulas for it and we use that, but, over time you come to just eyeball things. I don't inject Dextrose into the abdominal cavity, but you can. On a newborn of about 5 pounds, I take about 1 CC of 50% Dextrose and inject that right between the skin and the muscle. Very slow, slightly faster than drip IV. That usually perks a dying kid up in about 5-10 minutes. At that point, the suckle response will often return and you can bottle feed without even bothering to tube feed. You want an alert kid able to suckle -- else you might get some milk in the lungs. When in doubt, tube feed. When they're cold, lifeless, floppy, can't keep the head up, can't suckle, eyes look dazed, suffering and intermittent cries....inject some glucose (plus 1 drop of homeopathic Arsenicum album 12C under the tongue) and they'll almost always come back to life for additional feeding in less than 30 minutes. From there, get them on the mother's milk and cholostrum ASAP.
It is 10 JAN 2010 today. We had 11 newborns in the dead of winter with more on the way. Of those, 4 births required assistance. Two of those 4 were from a dried up old doe we should cull, but...well. :-) Of 4 problematic kids, 2 came out premature and underweight to a first time nanny. Both were weak, floppy, hypothermic, and one went comatose right away. Dex brought both back to life, but the runt had something else wrong. Just wouldn't come up and later expired. Sis -- formerly comatose -- is undersize, but doing great! Got her back on the doe as soon as able to stand, suckle, and walk. They take off from there. The other two born to the dried up doe (this vid) were born big and strong. The runt is on the weaker side and I put him back outdoors too soon....so he slipped into hypothermia briefly. The stronger sister slipped into lifelessness / quasi-coma / hypothermia / glycemic crash from also being outside too soon and having no milk access all night long (due to inability to find the bottle; You want to keep good control of kids in a contained area when weak like that and having no access to mother's milk. I overestimated their smarts.)
11 kids this winter. 1 loss. 3 saves that would otherwise have been lost without these tactics. All normal and problematic kids skipping around in less than 7 days. No saveable kid in quasi-coma longer than about 30 minutes with improvement trends starting in 5 minutes from injection.
* They really do dirty up a bathtub, but I do that with the few weak ones that need some care between midnight and morning rather than put outside in a kid box or go outside in the cold to check on them at 3 a.m. Much easier. Easy enough to clean the tub. Very important to keep the weak ones warm.
* Glucose injection can also be a very powerful combat & ER tactic in saving human life where hypothermic (or in shock) because hypoglycemia goes hand in hand. That + homeopathy + Vitamin C + Adrenal supplement + warmth = shock reversal. Use of sodium or potassium drip as needed.