# Sick goat, too much grain?



## SweetSaanens (Mar 6, 2011)

Yesterday 2 of my goats got out and broke into the barn and tipped their grain bin over helping themselves. There is no way to know for sure how much they ate because all the chickens found out what they had done and helped. I watched them closely and didn't give any grain that night. This morning I gave them half the grain they would usually get and they both ate it all up and were acting fine.
This afternoon I noticed one had diarrhea and she is now of her feed. I took her temp 104.2 so I gave her a shot to bring her temp down and put out baking soda for her.
I am stuck at the house with no way to get her to the vet anything else I should do?
She had kids a week ago and her udder is quite small so I am not sure she has enough to feed them right now and I am not sure if I should be letting them feed from her. 
It is possible that she managed to get into something else before she got into the barn but I don't have a clue what it could be.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated


----------



## liz (Oct 5, 2007)

Baking soda is good, but only if she ate it....diarrhea is good, it's the bodies way of pushing out toxins, make balls out of the baking soda by adding a little water and force her to eat them, you will also need to keep her up and moving, and get those kids to nurse,even if you have to milk her, they need to eat.

What shot did you give her to bring her temp down?


----------



## SweetSaanens (Mar 6, 2011)

Thank you.

I talked to the vet and the tell tale sign that it was grain overload and not something else was the diarrhea smelling very sweet (like brown sugar).

The shot I gave her was a left over shot from her sister that is the same size but I forget the name. The vet said it was safe to use while pregnant or nursing and that it was a non steroidal anti inflammatory and fever reducer.

The kids are nursing but her udder is tiny so I gave them a bottle each for the night. It was their first bottle and they both finished it. She keeps standing on the milk stand to get away from them. 

To anyone else who experiences this and then looks online and panics (because I read several articles online saying that if treatment isn't begun as soon as possible it gets harder to treat and goats will likely die in 2-4 days! which of course set me of in a panic) The vet I called said as long as she is drinking (after the first 24 hours) and trying to eat just keep an eye on her and keep her moving. He also recommended going out and picking a bunch of blackberry leaves for her. He also said to give baking soda 2 tbs mixed with warm water for a drench for a Saanen doe about 135-140lbs.

Liz, thank you for the baking soda ball idea. Next time I will try that as I only had a 3ml syringe on hand to squirt it in her mouth and had to refill it 4 times......She was not happy about it!


----------

