# Packing After Injury?



## imaginationacres (Sep 27, 2009)

Hi there, I'm new to the forum and packing with goats!  I'm Whitney in VA. 

I have 5 nigerian dwarf wethers and had been training my two oldest Fiddle and Tambourine who will be 2 in April to walk/lead and eventually carry a pack. The other 2 younger ones will be training when they're older and the third has a serious congenital heart defect so he's just a spoiled pet. 

We have been making great progress but unfortunately Fiddle injured his back left leg. I'm not entirely sure how he did it, vet believes it is a soft tissue injury as there were no obvious breaks or fractures. He has weight bearing lameness and the course of action is strict rest and confinement for the next 6 weeks or so with pain management. 

I'm wondering if anyone has had a goat injure themselves like this and still were able to return to the trail down the line? I certainly don't want to hurt him further and will of course be monitoring his recovery day by day but I'm a bit bummed if he may not be able to pack again.


----------



## jeep (Jan 18, 2011)

I'm no expert, however my dad is a large animal vet and I've been around horses and livestock all my life. I would venture to say, just follow the vets recommendations and it will probably all work out just fine. I've had horses get bone chips in their knees, and another horse had a bowed tendon. I gave each horse a year off and a year later brought them back slowly and they both were able to perform full bore once again. A pigmy goat isn't fighting all the weight that a horse has to deal with when lame also. So just believe in what the Vet has to say and try to be patient. I'm willing to bet he'll be just fine after some rest. But then again, I'm pretty new to the goat business.


----------



## sanhestar (Dec 10, 2008)

Hello,

just let it heal and give him time to get back in shape.


----------



## Cazz (Jun 9, 2010)

He's a cute little guy! I thought he was a girl at first from his name, as we named one of our does Tambourine.
I also think he should be fine with some time to recover. One of our bucks kids got a front leg hooked in some mesh when he went over the top, twisted it badly and would have thought he nearly broke it. His was quite serious, so he did take a while, but within six months or so he was right again, and now he can carry just as much as another his size and hasn't had the slightest limp since then.  
Cheers,
Cazz


----------



## imaginationacres (Sep 27, 2009)

Thank you for the replies and encouragement. Unfortunately the vets and I approached his leg problem all wrong.. It turned out he did not injure the leg but actually was infected with a meningeal deerworm. We didn't figure it out til his neuroligical symptoms appeared, where he went completely down in both hind legs and began circling. 

He's on his 2nd week of treatment with ivermectin, panacur, dexamethasone and banamine.. Unfortunately since none of us realized his symtoms were neuroligical and we thought injury we may not have started treatment in time for all of his symptoms to clear. He is able to walk and get around just find but he is still dragging the back left leg and lacks proprioception of the hoof. This is a huge improvement of going completey down/circling.

I have learned a valuable lesson and will be much more viligent in the future if I see a goat going lame. Its unfortunate, he was on regular worming and fecal tests but since goats are not ideal hosts they don't shed the eggs in the stool.. My fingers are crossed he will continue to improve but I have a feeling his packing days are over..


----------



## Rex (Nov 30, 2008)

Thanks for sharing this bit of knowledge. Maybe it will help someone else detect it quicker with their own goat..

Don't beat yourself up over it. Those symptoms can be an indicator of a bunch of things including mineral or vitamin deficiencies or an injury. In the western states we don't have a bad problem with it. Maybe more so on the west coats where it is wet and rainy. For anyone interested in learning more about meningeal deer worm I posted a link to a good article. http://www.tennesseemeatgoats.com/artic ... lworm.html


----------



## goathiker (Apr 14, 2011)

Luckily, us rainy west coasters only have black tail deer and so far these parasites have only been known to come from white tail deer. We do need to watch though, who knows when they will jump species.


----------

